OF 


JULY 25,- 1854. 


VANDEBOGERT. 


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THE 


CHLEBRATION 


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THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY 


DR. NOTTS PRESIDENCY 
UNION COLLEGE. 


JULY 25, 1854. 


SCHENECTADY: 
PUBLISHED BY G. Y. VANDEBOGERT. 
1854. 


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Ar the close of the Alumni meeting, on the afternoon of July 
25, 1854, the following resolution was adopted : 


Resolved, That the thanks of the Alumni of Union College, here 
present, be and they are hereby tendered to the Hon. Judge Camp- 
BELL, and the Rev. Dr. Way.anp, for the very appropriate, interest- 
ing and instructive addresses delivered by them this morning ; that 
copies thereof be requested for publication ; and that the same, when 
obtained, be published under the direction of the Faculty of the Col- 
lege, together with the address of Dr. Norr to the Alumni, and the 
proceedings of the meeting. 


In compliance with the above resolution, the Faculty appointed 
one of their number to obtain the addresses, &c. above referred 
to, and to edit their publication in the volume which is here 
presented, and hereby respectfully and cordially dedicated to 
the Alumni, present and absent. 


CONTENTS. 


Origin and Preliminary Proceedings, 


Judge Campbell’s Address, 
Dr. Wayland’s Address, 

Dr. Nott’s Address, - - 
Alumni Meeting, le Ree 
Judge Parker’s Remarks, - 
Dr. Kennedy’s Remarks, - 
Dr. Chester’s Remarks, - 
Mr. Tracy’s Remarks, - 
Dr. EHaton’s Remarks, - 
Dr. Hamilton’s Remarks, - 
Rey. Mr. Brooks’s Remarks, 
Concluding Proceedings, - 
Ode, ' - - - 
Appendix to Dr. Nott’s Address, 


Origin of the Celebration, 


PRELIMINARY PROCEEDINGS. 


A meetine of the Alumni of Union College was held at Schenectady, 
July 27th, 1853, the day of the Annual Commencement, immediately 
after the Alumni dinner. Rev. Ropney A. Mitier. D. D., of Wor- 
cester, Mass., Chairman, and Rev. Grorce J. Harrison, of New- 
Haven, Conn., Secretary. 

It was stated by the Hon, Wittram Taytor, of New-York, that 
the Commencement in the year 1854, would be the Fiftieth Anniversary 
of President Norv’s accession to the Presidency of the College, and on 
motion, it was resolved to commemorate the occasion in a suitable 
manner, and that a Committee of Alumni of the College be appointed 
to devise measures for carrying out the resolution. 

The following named gentlemen were appointed said committee :— 
R. M. Brarcurorp, Esq., Chairman, Judge Witt1am Kent, Judge 
W. W. Campsett, Hon. Wm. Taytor, New-Yorr, and Rev. Auex. 
McCxernann, D. D., New-Brunswick, to whom were added the Chair- 
man and Secretary of the meeting. 

The following preamble and resolutions were also passed at a meet- 
ing of the Board of Trustees of Union College, held July 28th, 1853: 


This Board having witnessed, for several years past, the unceasing 
efforts made to impair the public confidence in this Institution, and to 
injure the character and destroy the usefulness of our distinguished 
President, have, with him, waited their time with a full confidence in 
the ultimate and triumphant result. This day, in pursuance of a 
determination formed and expressed more than twenty years ago, and 
the effectual accomplishment of which was many years since secured 
by the proper legal papers to take effect in the event of his unexpected 
decease, Dr. Nort has delivered to this Board, in trust, for the use of 
the College, money, securities and property of the estimated value of 


(9) 


6 


inore than sta hundred thousand dollars. This result, the fruit of 
individual skill and far-sighted policy, with donations previously made, 
shows the noble disinterestedness which has marked his whole admi- 
nistration of the affairs of Union College, and which entitles him to the 
highest credit and honor, and to the lasting gratitude of all friends of 
education, and of the amelioration of our race ; therefore, 

Resolved, That the Trustees, representing the College, and as indi- 
viduals, feeling a deep interest in the cause of education, tender to our 
venerable President our warmest thanks for his noble and disinterested 
conduct, for the moral courage and firmness with which he has met the 
assaults made upon his character, and for his munificent endowment of 
the Institution committed to our charge. 

Resolved, That the Hon. J oun C. Spencer, who has so thoroughly, 
so earnestly, and so ably vindicated this Institution and its Officers ; 
whose masterly argument carries conviction to every candid and enquir- 
ing mind; and whose labors in this cause, voluntarily undertaken, 
were labors of love for his Alma Mater and her venerable President, 
has added new claims to our respect for him as a lawyer and a man, 
and deserves from us and all the Graduates and friends of the College 
a grateful acknowledgment. 

Resolved, That we earnestly request all the Graduates of Union 
College to meet us at the next Annual Commencement, and unite in 
congratulations to Dr. Norr.at the then close of fifty years since he 
entered on his duties as President, and to rejoice with him and with 
us in the prosperity of this Institution, to the advancement of which 
he has so successfully devoted the energies of a great mind, for this 
unexampled period of half a century. 


The Committee of the Alumni met pursuant to a-call of the Chair- 
man, on May 12th, 1854, and requested the Faculty of the College 
to take charge of the preliminary arrangements. Professors Jackson 
and GILLESPIE were accordingly appointed by the Faculty a Committee 
for this purpose. 

The following Circular was then issued and sent to every Graduate 
whose address could be obtained : 

Union Cotreas, Scuenzcrapy, June 1, 1854. 
Dear Sir: 

At the last College Commencement, the Alumni present adopted 
a resolution to commemorate, this year, the Viftieth Anniversary of 
Dr. Nort’s accession to the Presidency of Union College, and ap- 
pointed a Committee to make arrangements for that object. The 


Board of Trustees of the College also warmly united in the movement, 
and passed the following resolution : 


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‘« Resolved, That we earnestly request all the Graduates of Union 
College to meet us at the next Annual Commencement, and unite in 
congratulations to Dr. Norr at the then close of fifty years since he 
entered on his duties as President, and to rejoice with him and with 
us in the prosperity of this Institution, to the advancement of which 
he has so successfully devoted the energies of a great mind, for this 
unexampled period of half a century.”’ 

The following arrangements have accordingly been made by the 
Committee acting for the Alumni : 

On Tuesday, July 25th, the day preceding Commencement, an 
Historical Discourse will be delivered by Hon. W. W. Campss tt, at 
10 o’clock A. M., in the Presbyterian Church, in Schenectady ; and 
will be followed by an address by Rev. Dr. Wayzanp. 

In the afternoon of the same day, at 2 o’clock, President Norv will 
address the Alumni. 

An Alumni meeting will then be held in the same place, and it is 
confidently expected that the occasion will be one of deep interest. 

In the evening, the President, Trustees, and Faculty, will receive 
the Alumni in the old (West) College. 

Your attendance is cordially invited. 

Please to inform the Committee, by a note to the Register of the 
College, whether you expect to be present, and on arrival proceed 
immediately to register your name at the old (West) College. 

By order of the Committee of Arrangements. 

R. M. BLATCHFORD, Chairman. 

Guorer J. Harrison, Secretary. 


These circulars were most cordially responded to, though many 
failed to reach those to whom they were addressed. 

The Graduates began to arrive in large numbers on the day previous 
to that of the Celebration. The hotels were soon filled. Many of the 
citizens hospitably opened their houses, and lodgings for about 100 
were also provided in the old College. An office for the registry of 
names and the delivery of tickets was established in the same place. 

Tuesday, July 25th, at 9 A. M., a procession was formed from the 
old College to the Church. The lower floor was reserved for the 
Graduates, and the galleries for ladies, the former accommodating 
about 750, and the latter 450. 

The Rey, Dr. Tucxzr, (class of 1814) opened the exercises with 
prayer. Music followed, and the first address was then delivered by 
Hon. W. W. Campsett, (class of 1827). 


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AN 


HISTORICAL ADDICESS 


DELIVERED BEFORE 


THE ALUMNI OF UNION COLLEGE, 


ON THE OCCASION OF THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY 


OF THE PRESIDENCY OF 


ELIPHALET NOTT, D.D., LL.D. 
JULY 25, 1854. 


BY 


Hon. W. W. CAMPBELL. 


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ADDRESS 


Tart life is long which reaches beyond four score years. ‘That 
life is useful, the record of whose days shows great improvements 
made in the industrial arts, promoting the comforts and conve- 
niences of man. When to length of days and active labors 
for the material mterests of the race are added wisdom, and 
knowledge, and philanthropy, and patriotism, and piety, all com- 
bined, and devoted to man’s moral and intellectual training here 
- and to his preparation for a home m heaven—then such a life 
becomes illustrious. 

Alumni of Union College: We are assembled this day to pay 
a tribute of respect to one whose life has been long, and useful, 
and illustrious; who in the good providence of God has been 
spared to witness the Fiftieth Anniversary of his Presidency of 
this Institution, and to welcome again under the parental roof so 
many of his returning children. ‘To-day we live in patriarchal 
times. Before one common intellectual father then kneel the 
gray-haired man of three score and ten years, the middle aged, 
and youth just entering upon manhood, and we all crave a 
blessing. 

On this interesting occasion I have been directed to make up - 
a record of the past. In the imperfect discharge of this duty 
an attempt will be made to give an outline sketch of some of 

(11) 


12 
those prominent events which are connected with the fortune and 
the fame of our Alma Mater and her distinguished President. | 

This year closes a century since the first establishment of a 
Collegiate Institution in New-York. In 1754, King’s College was 
endowed and chartered. From that period down to the Revolu- 
tion it was prosperous, and signally successful in the scholars 
who were there educated. Among a number of eminent men 
may be mentioned especially Joun JAY, Ropert R. Livineston, 
and ALEXANDER Hamiuton. The storm of the Revolution came. 
The city of New-York was in the possession of the enemy, and the 
College edifice was converted into a hospital for British soldiers. 
In 1784 the Regents of the University were first incorporated. 
Under their government the College was placed ; the name was 
changed to Columbia College, and in that year, under favorable 
auspices, with DeWrrt Ciinton as its first student, it entered 
on its new career. 

In 1787 an act was passed incorporating anew the Regents 
of the University, amending and consolidating previous acts and 
giving them power of visiting and governing all Academies, of: 
granting diplomas and degrees, and also of incorporating such 
Academies and Colleges as should be endowed by the citizens of 
any particular locality. 

The most curious provision in that act of 1787, is that the 
Regents of the University thus incorporated were permitted to 
hold real or personal property “to the amount of the annual 
income of forty thousand bushels of wheat.” Thus as it were 
making wheat instead of gold and silver the standard of value, 
and showing at the same time the strong agricultural tendencies 
of the people. 

To the Regents of the University a successful application was 
made in 1795, by the inhabitants of Schenectady and vicinity, 
for the incorporation of Union College. The subscribers proposed 
an endowment of $30,000, in lands, obligations, and money. 


13 


Of the latter, one thousand three hundred and ninety pounds 
were subscribed. The subscriptions were numerous, and ranged 
from one dollar up to one hundred dollars, the latter bemg the 
largest money subscription, except that of Gen. Purnip ScHUYLER, 
who, when forwarding the charter, added his own subscription for 
one hundred pounds, or two hundred and fifty dollars. 

This was not, however, the earliest effort which had been 
made for the establishment of a College at this place. In 1782, 
an application was made to the Legislature, and in 1792 and 
1793, other applications to the Regents. 

In the memorial of 1795, they say: ‘That in the year one 
thousand seven hundred and eighty-two, the citizens of the north- 
ern and western parts of this state, together with the inhabitants 
of the Town of Schenectady, amounting to near twelve hundred 
subscribers, applied to the Legislature, in session in the town of 
Kingston, for the institution of a College in the town of Schenec- 
tady, for founding which the citizens of Schenectady alone pro- 
posed an estate valued at nearly eight thousand pounds princi- 
pal.” 

A passing notice is due to this interesting statement. The 
application was made to the Legislature, in session in the town 
of Kingston, two years before the incorporation of the Regents 
of the University, and the revival of Columbia College. The: 
representatives of the people were assembled in that town, where 
had been completed and given to the world the first Constitution 
of the State of New-York—in that town where, during the 
ravages of war, the only institution of learning in the State of 
any prominence had been kept up, where the children of ,the 
patriots could be educated. The application was made, it is 
gaid, in 1782, and signed by twelve hundred citizens of the north- 
ern and western parts of the State. The war of the Revolution 
had not then closed. ‘The smoke still went up from the smoulder- 
ing ruins of burning dwellings on the northern and western borders. 


14 


The echo of the Indian war-whoop had not yet died away im this 
beautiful valley of the Mohawk. ‘The citizens of Schenectady 
alone proposed to give an estate of £8,000 for the endowment 
of the College. It is now seen how ardent was the attachment 
of our Revolutionary ancestors to the cause of learning, and 
what efforts and sacrifices they were willing to make for its 
advancement. 

In 1795 Union College obtained a corporate existence from 
the Regents of the University. Ina letter of 2d March, of that 
year, Gen. ScHuYLER announced the gratifying event, and, ten- 
dering his congratulations, and his subscription to the funds, 
that good man, whose memory is still fragrant in this region, 
invokes a blessmmg in which we may all this day unite: ‘ May 
indulgent Heaven protect and cherish an institution calculated 
to promote virtue and the weal of the people.” 

Dr. JouN Buatr SmiTH, of Philadelphia, was chosen President ; 
and, with one Professor, the new College was inaugurated. In 
1797, the first Commencement was held —the Governor and chief 
officers of State attending; and three young gentlemen received 
their Bachelor’s degree. Dr. JonatHan Epwarps succeeded 
Dr.'/Smiru in the Presidency. He was removed by death in about 
a year. Dr. Epwarps was succeeded by Dr. JonatHan Maxcy, 
who remained in office till 1804, when the present President 
took charge of the Institution. He was still a young man, though 
he had even then considerable experience as an instructor of 
youth. His previous history was not without interest. In the 
early part of the last century, a small body of Scotch-Irish 
Presbyterians had founded a colony on the head waters of the 
Susquehanna, which they had called Cherry Valley. There 
they had organized a church and established a classical school. 
For nearly forty years before the Revolution, it was an outpost 
of Christianity and civilization in the wilderness. Cut off in the 
war of the Revolution, at the commencement of peace the exiled 


15 


inhabitants who survived the war returned to their former homes, 
and over their fathers’ graves pledged themselves to renew their 
covenants, and to rebuild their house of worship. Again they 
re-established a classical school, and erected a spacious edifice 
for its accommodation. It was in the year 1794, that a young 
clergyman from the State of Connecticut, passing unnoticed 
and unknown through Albany, made his way on horseback along 
the great western turnpike, then just opening, to the settlement 
at Cherry Valley. He was received there with open arms, and 
was soon installed in the double capacity of minister and instruc- 
tor in the Academy. 

Need I add that this young man was EiipHatet Notr. Thus, 
before the incorporation of the College, he commenced his career 
as a teacher of youth. 

After a few years’ residence in Cherry Valley, he was called 
as pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in the city of Albany, 
and then immediately took his place as one of the most eloquent 
and promising men of that day. The year 1804 was memorable 
as that in which were changed the fortunes of several of the 
most prominent citizens of New-York. Haminron made his 
greatest efforts at the bar; fell ma duel; and the pall of civil 
death settled on AARON Burr. Tuomas Appis Emmert landed 
on our shores; and JoHN WELLS made his eloquent and learned 
speech in the defence of JAMES CHEETHAM, and as it were in a 
single bound, took his place in the first rank of American law- 
yers. JAMES Kent became Chief Justice of the State; and 
Dantet D, Tompxins was first elected a member of Congress 
from the city of New-York. Dr. Norr delivered his great 
sermon, an eulogy on the death of Gen. HAMILTON, and was soon 
after transferred from the church to the Presidency of this 
College. 

In 1804 Union College was still a feeble Institution. It 
required students, and needed pecuniary means. Though Dr, 


16 


Buarr Suira, Dr. Epwarps and Dr. Maxcy were among the 
most distinguished scholars and divines of that day, very little pro- 
egress had been made. ‘The whole number of graduates during 
the nine years of their presidencies, was only sixty-three. In 
1813, nine years after Dr. Nort entered on his duties, the orad- 
uating class alone numbered forty-seven, being three-fourths as 
many as graduated in the first nine years. 

But still the College required more pecuniary means ; better 
and more ample accommodations were needed for the greatly 
increased number of students. 

As yet, the State had done but little for the Institution. It 
had made a loan to aid in the erection of new buildings, but had 
taken the bond of the College as security for its repayment. 
Under this state of things was passed the law of 1814, which 
laid the foundation of the fortunes of Union College, and greatly 
contributed to the prosperity of others. In a note to this bill n 
the edition of the laws of that year, the compiler justly remarks : 
‘¢ No bill before the legislature created greater interest than this. 
Much credit is due to the unwearied exertions of the able and 
eloquent President of Union College in procuring its passage.” 

Under that act, $40,000 was to be raised for Hamilton Col- 
lege, $30,000 for the College of Physicians and Surgeons. 
Columbia College, which had been a favored Institution,“and 
which had previously received by direct gifts from the State and 
corporation of New-York, more than sixty thousand dollars, took 
under this act the property known as the Botanical Garden, 
previously owned by the State, and which at this day, by reason 
of the great increase in the value of real estate in the city of 
New-York, now adds to the property of that Institution several 
hundreds of thousands of dollars. Union College was to have 
two hundred thousand dollars, of which one hundred thousand 
dollars were to be appropriated to the erection of College edi- 
fices ; thirty thousand dollars to pay then existing debts; twenty 


17 


thousand dollars to be used in the purchase of a library and phi- 
losophical apparatus, and fifty thousand dollars was to constitute 
a fund, the income of which was to be applied to the education 
of indigent young men. | 

How the College, which devoted the money to the erection of 
buildings, and to the payment of debts, could be expected to 
have that same money on hand forty years afterwards, passes 
comprehension, and I fear no Graduate can be found whose 
mathematical knowledge will be adequate to the solution of the 
problem. 

It will be borne in mind, that under the loan of 1814, no 
absolute grant was made by the State, except that of the lands 
in the city of New-York to Columbia College. 

The funds to the other Institutions were to be derived from 
the profits of lotteries and were contingent on their success. 

I may remark in this connection, as an interesting fact, that 
the first gift by the State, or rather Province of New-York, to 
King’s College, was the proceeds of a lottery authorized at the 
time of incorporation in 1754. From that time down, for a 
period of more than sixty years, it was a favorite method of rais- _ 
ing funds. During the first forty years of the existence of New- 
York as a State, her statute books are filled with special laws 
in relation to this subject. Roads were to be made, and rivers 
cleared of obstructions ; bridges to be built, and the poor to be 
fed; public buildings erected, and academies and colleges 
founded and supported, by the profits of lotteries. 

There is not time to enter upon the consideration of the many 
difficulties and embarrassments which attended the drawing of 
the Literature Lotteries and the realizing of the funds by the 
College. The State, which undertook at first to conduct the 
drawing, entirely failed of success, and finally they were turned 
over to the College, and it was only by the great skill of Dr. 
Nort that the funds after many years were realized. 


C 


18 


As far back as 1831, in a report made on the finances of the 
College, by Siuas Wriewr and Wini1aAmM JaAmgs, of Albany, 
(than whom, perhaps, two more searching and careful men could 
not be found in the State,) mention is made of the exertions of 
the President in the following terms : 

‘¢ This is not the occasion, neither is it the intention of the 
signers, to eulogize individuals who are in the full enjoyment and 
exercise of high and distinguished faculties, and from whom so 
much good to the College is yet hoped for and expected ; when 
that time shall arrive an ample source for commendation will be 
found in reviewing the exertions with the wise and well-directed 
force of talent and influence that procured the greater part of 
the funds which your committee have been examining.” 

Not only were the original grants secured, but to them con- 
siderable additions were made under the careful management of 
the President. And the same committee, in alluding to this 
in another part of the report, remark: ‘* Indeed, these results 
are of a character which nearly defy credulity.”’ 

What would Siuas Wricut and WILLIAM JAMES say, if they 
were present to-day and were told of an additional endowment 
from the same source, of more than six hundred thousand dol- 
lars? Passing over the ex-parte reports and examinations of those 
hostile to the College and its President, and which it is not neces- 
sary on this occasion to take up time in showing to have been 
groundless, I shall simply call attention to the concluding para- 
graph of the report of the Committee of the Senate, made in 
January of the present year, and which it may be observed was 
the only report made when the President and Trustees had an 
opportunity of being fully heard. It may be considered the 
first judgment in the controversy : 

“¢ That in all these transactions the purposes of Dr. Nort have 
been pure and benevolent, and his whole conduct marked with 
the strictest integrity, is most satisfactorily established by the 


Le 


evidence before us, the results of which’ we have given in this 
report. But we should do injustice to him and to our own 
feelings, if we were to omit the declaration that, in our judg- 
ment, not only the great prosperity of Union College, but its 
very existence during periods of great calamity, are owing almost 
exclusively to his life-long efforts, sacrifices and hazards in its 
behalf. He has been and is a public benefactor in promoting 
the great cause of education, on which our institutions, our pro- 
perty, our security and our liberty depend. Such a noble ex- 
ample should not be deprived of the merit to which it is entitled, 
or of its just influence upon others, by unworthy suspicions, 
founded upon partial views of the facts, or by individual hostility 
seeking its gratification by misrepresentations. And we, who 
have been required by official duty and upon our high responsi- 
bilities to scrutinize the conduct of the individual who has fur- 
nished such an example, may not shrink from the obligation of 
manfully avowing our disinterested and conscientious convic- 
tion.” 

The fifty years of Dr. Norr’s Presidency has ended. Dur- 
ing that period he has been at the head of the government and 
of the educational department of the College, and has personally 
instructed more than three thousand men, whose influence is now 
felt in all professions and in all branches of art and science in 
this broad land. He has sustamed in all respects his early 
reputation as a most effective and eloquent preacher of the Gos- 
pel. Few men in the country have made as many useful and 
important improvements, especially in the applications of heat 
and steam. Poor himself, he came to the College in its poverty. 
He may present it to-day endowed with more than a million of 
dollars, the fruits of his mdividual skill and industry. Let the 
world offer a parallel, if it can. 

The Semi-Centennial Anniversary of this College was cele- 
brated in 1845. At the close of another fifty years from that 


20 


time, our children and their children may assemble here on 
the day which shall terminate the first hundred years. But 
neither to us nor to them, in all human probability, will another 
event like the present call together the children of this Institu- 
tion. But it will not be forgotten. The great endowment will 
be [an ever-living and constant memorial. This College will 
stand an ever-abiding monument of the wisdom and generosity 
of him who has been its benefactor and virtual founder. Here 
in future years successive generations of youth shall come. 
Grateful for the provisions made for their liberal education, 
they shall gather round the sacred spot which may contain the 
ashes of him to whose princely generosity they will be indebted ; 
and his name and his deeds will be embalmed in the memories 
of men long after his calumniators shall have passed away and 
be forgotten. 


At the conclusion of Judge Camppeny’s Address, an appropriate 
Ode was sung, and Dr. Norr entered the Church, in compliance with 
the request of the next speaker. His appearance on the platform was 
received with intense excitement and enthusiasm among the Alumni. 
Dr. Waytanp then delivered the following Address. 


THE EDUCATION DEMANDED 
Hy the People of the Cuites States, 


A 
DISCOURSE 


DELIVERED AT UNION COLLEGE, SCHENECTADY, 


ON THE OCCASION OF THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY 


OF THE PRESIDENCY OF 


ELIPHALET NOTT, D.D., LU. D. 
JULY 25, 1854. 
BY 


FRANCIS WAYLAND, 


PRESIDENT OF BROWN UNIVERSITY. 


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DISCOURSE, 


GENTLEMEN, 
Atumnt or Unton Counce: 

Tne reason of my appearing before you may be very briefly 
told. ‘The man, whom every Graduate of Union College loves 
‘as a friend and venerates as a parent, thought proper to request 
me to perform this service. Though gray hairs have long since 
admonished me to decline all similar engagements, yet an inti- 
mation from him, to whom I owe more than to any other living 
man, was as imperative as when, in yonder halls, a thoughtless 
boy, I first listened to those counsels in which wisdom and elo- 
quence were so marvelously blended. Iam as well aware as 
any of you can be, of my inability to meet the just demands of 
this occasion. Gladly, therefore, would I have learned that the 
choice of my honored instructor had fallen upon some more 
gifted pupil. But, in the words of Dr. JoHNSON, on a different. 
occasion, *‘ It was not for me to bandy compliments with my 
sovereion. ‘The king said it, and it was so.’ Bowing to an 
authority which it would be treason to call in question, you 
behold me, therefore, already at my work. 

I am requested to discuss the principles which should govern 
the system of collegiate education in our age and country. 

Let us in the first place consider some of the principles which 
should govern education in general. 


(23) 


24 


By education we mean that culture cither of body or mind, 
which shall enable us the better to discharge the duties of our 
present probation and prepare for the results which shall emerge _ 
from that probation hereafter. It comprehends, therefore, — 
every interest of humanity. Its influence must be felt through- 
out the ages of an endless duration. Necessity obliges us, how- 
ever, on this occasion, to treat only of the culture of our intellec- 
tual nature. 

If you will allow me to commence with an elementary thought, 
I would remark, that every act of mind ends in a knowledge, 
sometimes only subjective, but generally both subjective and 
objective. ‘Thus I am conscious of a simple emotion; here is a 
mental act, a mere subjective knowledge. I perceive a tree ; 
here is a subjective consciousness and an objective knowledge. 
And, on the other hand, every knowledge presupposes an act 
of mind; for were there no mind, or were the mind incapable of 
action, knowledge would be impossible. 

From this simple and obvious fact, it has naturally come to 
pass that men have looked upon the subject of education from 
two distinct points of view, as they have contemplated either the 
act of mind, or the knowledge in which it results. Hence, some 
have considered education to consist merely in the communica- 
tion of knowledge; others almost entirely in the discipline of 
mind. If the first be our object, it will be successfully accom- 
plished precisely in proportion to the amount and the value of 
the knowledge which we communicate. If, on the other hand, 
we desire simply to cultivate the intellect, our success must be 
measured by the number of faculties which we improve, and the 
degree of culture which we have imparted to them. 

It is, I presume, for this reason, that a division has, to a con- 
siderable degree, been established between the studies which 
enter into our course of higher education. Some of them, of 
which the results are acknowledged to be in general valueless, 


25 


are prosecuted on account of the mental discipline which they 
are supposed to impart. That they tend to nothing practical, has 
sometimes been deemed their appropriate excellence. Hence, 
some learned men have exulted rather facetiously in the “ glo- 
rious inutility”’ of the studies which they recommend. On the 
other hand; there are many studies which communicate know- 
ledge, admitted by all men to be indispensable, which are sup- 
posed to convey no mental discipline, or, at least, only that 
which is of the most elementary character. Hence, you at 
once perceive that a wide ground for debate is afforded, which 
writers on education have not been backward to occupy. Hence, 
also, the various discussions on the best methods of education, 
which seem to me to approach with but slow and unequal steps to 
any definite conclusion. ‘The studies which are most relied on 
for mental discipline, for instance, are the classics and the mathe- 
matics. While the advocates for these discard, almost contemp- 
tuously, all other methods of culture, they are by no means 
agreed among themselves. ‘The mathematicians look with small 
favor upon the lovers of lexicons, and paradigms, and accents ; 
and claim that nothing but exact science can invigorate the 
power of ratiocination, on which all certainty of knowledge 
depends. The philologists, on the other hand, inveigh in no 
measured terms against the narrow range of mathematical cul- 
ture, and boldly affirm that it unfits men for all reasoning con- 
cerning matter actually existing, while it withers up every deli- 
cate sentiment and turns into an arid waste the entire field of 
our emotional nature. Here issue is joined, and I am compelled 
in truth to add, adhue sub judice lis est. 

But is it not possible to escape from the smoke and din of this 
eontroversy, and look upon this question from a somewhat higher 
point of view? It may,I think, be safely taken for granted, that 
the system of which we form a part, is the work of a Being of 
infinite wisdom and infinite benevolence. He made the world | 

D 


26 


without us and the world within us, and he manifestly made each 
of them for the other. He has made knowledge, intellectual 
culture and progress, all equally necessary to our individual and 
social well-being. He abhors all castes, and desires that every 
one of his children shall enjoy to the full all the means of happi- 
ness which have been committed to his trust. Is it then to be 
supposed that he has made for our brief probation two kinds of 
knowledge ; one necessary for the attamment of our means of 
happiness, but incapable of nourishing and strengthening the soul ; 
and the other, tending to self-culture, but leading to no single 
practical advantage? Shall we believe that the God and Father 
of all has made the many to labor by blind rules for the good of 
the few, without the possibility of spiritual elevation ; and the 
few to learn nothing that shall promote the happiness of the 
whole, living on the labors of others, selfishly building themselves 
up in intellectual superiority ? Is it not rather to be believed, 
that he has made each of these ends to harmonize with the other, 
so that all intellectual culture shall issue in knowledge which 
shall confer benefits on the whole ; and all knowledge properly 
acquired, shall in an equal degree tend to intellectual develop- 
ment? Did God manifest himself in the flesh, in the form of a 
carpenter’s son, to create an intellectual aristocracy, and con- 
sign the remaining millions of our race to daily toil, excluded 
from every opportunity for spiritual improvement? Did he not 
rather appear to scatter blessings broad-cast upon all born of 
woman, so that every individual of the race whose form he had 
assumed, might cultivate to its highest perfection his intellectual 
and moral nature, and thus grow up into the stature of a perfect 
man in Christ Jesus ? | 

These expectations seem to me to be reasonable. If so, we 
might surely anticipate that all knowledge acquired according 
to the established laws of mind, would be productive of selfcul- 
. ture. Nay, we might suppose that that which God had made 


at 


most necessary to our existence, would be, in the highest degree, 
self-disciplinary. Thus every one, whatever his position, may 
well be supposed to possess the means of developing |his own 
powers, and arriving at the standing of an intellectual man. 
There is nothing in the nature of any occupation that renders 
such an expectation extravagant. ‘The uncles of Hugh Miller 
were highly cultivated men, reading the best books, concerning 
one of whom he remarks, * there are professors of natural history, 
who know less of living nature than was known by uncle Sandy ;” 
and yet one of them was a harness-maker, and the other a stone- 
mason ; each laboring industriously at his calling, for daily bread, 
for six days in the week. 

But if we take no account of the acquisition of knowledge and 
confine ourselves simply to intellectual culture, I apprehend that 
we shall arrive at substantially the same result. Suppose that 
our sole object is to develop the powers of the human mind. We 
must then first ask what are these powers. It will be sufficient 
for our present purpose to consider the following, as they are 
allowed to be the most important: Perception, by which we 
arrive at a knowledge of the phenomena of the world without 
us; Consciousness, by which we become aware of the changes 
in the world within us; Abstraction and Generalization, by 
which our knowledge of individuals becomes the knowledge 
of classes; Reasoning, by which we use the known to discover 
the unknown; Imagination, by which we construct pictures 
in poetry and ideals in philosophy; and Memory, by which 
all these various forms of past knowledge are recalled and made 
available for the present. I am not, however, strenuous con- 
cerning this division of the faculties of the human mind. Let 
him who disapproves of it, make a better for himself. I will 
have no controversy with him; only let him present the faculties 
by which the most important acts of the mind are performed, 
and let his description be definite, so that we may clearly under- 
stand his terminology. 


28 


Now, if such be the powers conferred on us by our Creator, 
it must, I think, be admitted that each of them is designed for 
a particular purpose, and that a human mind would be fatally 
deficient were any one of them wanting. In our cultivation 
of mind, then, we must have respect not to one or two of them, 
but to all; since that is the most perfect mind in which all of 
them are the most fully developed. 

If, then, we desire to improve the intellect of man by study, 
it is obvious that that study will be the best adapted to our pur- 
pose which cultivates not one, but all, of these faculties, and cul- 
tivates them all most thoroughly. We cultivate our powers of 
every kind by exercise, and that study will most effectually aid 
us in the work of self-development, which requires the original 
exercise of the greatest number of them. 

Supposing this to be admitted, which I think will not be de- 
nied, the question will arise what studies are best adapted 
to our purpose. ‘This is a question which cannot be settled by 
authority. We are just as capable of deciding it as the men 
who have gone before us. They were once lke ourselves, men 
of the present, and their wisdom has not certaimly received any 
addition from the slumber of centuries. They may have been 
able to judge correctly for the time that then was, but could 
they revisit us now, they might certainly be no better able than 
ourselves to judge correctly for the time that now is. If any of 
us should be heard of two hundred years hence, it would surely 
be strange folly for the men of A. D. 2054 to receive our say- 
ings as oracles concerning the conditions of society which will 
be then existmg. God gives to every age the means for per- 
ceiving its own wants and discovering the best manner of sup- 
plying them; and it is, therefore, certainly best that every age 
should decide such questions for itself. We cannot, certainly, 
decide them by authority. 


29 
e 

There are two methods by which we can determine the truth 
in this matter. First, we may examine any particular study 
and observe the faculties of mmd which it does and which it 
does not call into action. very reasonable man, at all ac- 
quainted with the nature of his own mind, will be able to do this. 
Take, for instance, the studies which are pursued for the sake 
merely of discipline. Do they call into exercise one or many of 
our faculties ? Suppose they cultivate the reasoning power, and 
the power of poetic combination? Do they do any thing else ? 
If not, what have we by which to improve the powers of obser- 
vation, of consciousness, of generalization, and combination, these 
most important and most valuable of our faculties. If, then, 
their range be so limited, it may be deserving of inquiry whether 
somes tudies which can improve a larger number of our facul- 
ties might not sometimes take their places; and yet more, 
whether they should occupy so large a portion of the time 
devoted to education. 

But we may examine the subject by another test. We may 
ask what are the results actually produced by devotion to those 
studies which are allowed to be merely disciplinary. We teach 
the mathematics to cultivate the reasoning power, and the Jan- 
guages to improve the imagination and the taste. We then may 
very properly inquire, are mathematicians better reasoners than 
other men, in matter not mathematical? As a student advances 
in the mathematics, do we find his powers of ratiocination, in 
anything but the relations of quantity, to be visibly improved ? 
Are philologists or classical students more likely to become poets, 
or artists, than other men, or, does their style by this mode of 
discipline approach more nearly to the classical models of their 
own, or of any other language ? 

It is by such considerations as these that this question is to 
be answered. We have long since abjured all belief in magical 
influences. If we cannot discover any law of nature by which 


30 


a cause produces its effect, and are unable to perceive that the 
effect is produced, we begin to doubt whether any causation 
exists in the matter. 

If there be any truth in the foregomg remarks, they would 
seem to lead us to the following conclusions : 

First, that every branch of study should be so taught as to 
accomplish both the results of which we have been speaking ; 
that is, that it should not only mcrease our knowledge, but also 
confer valuable discipline; and that it should not only confer 
valuable discipline, but also increase our knowledge; and that, 
if it does not accomplish both of these results, there is either 
some defect in our mode of teaching, or the study is imperfectly 
adapted to the purposes of education. 

Secondly, that there seems no good reason for claiming pre- 
eminence for one study over another, at least in the manner to 
which we have been accustomed. ‘I'he studies merely disciplin- 
ary have valuable practical uses. ‘To many pursuits they are 
important, and_.to some indispensable. Let them, then, take 
their proper place in any system of good learning, and claim 
nothing more than to be judged of by their results. Let them 
not be the unmeaning shibboleth of a caste; but, standing on 
the same level with all other intellectual pursuits, be valued 
exactly in proportion to their ability to increase the power and 
range and skill of the human mind, and to furnish it with that 
knowledge which shall most signally promote the well-being and 
happiness of humanity. 

And, thirdly, it would seem that our whole system of instruc- 
tion requires an honest, thorough and candid revision. It has 
been for centuries the child of authority and precedent. If those 
before us made it what it is, by applying to it the resources 
of earnest and fearless thought, I can see no reason why we, by 
pursuing the same course, might not improve it. God intended 
us for progress, and we counteract his design when we deify 


31 


antiquity, and bow down and worship an opinion, not because it 
is either wise or true, but merely because it is ancient. 

But, supposing all these questions to be settled, and that we 
perfectly understood the nature of the human mind, the studies 
best adapted to improve it, and the manner of teaching them so 
as best to accomplish our purpose, it might be supposed that the 
work of providing a system of education for a people would be 
easy. Such would be the case, provided that men were made 
in all respects precisely alike, and were placed in exactly the 
same circumstances. If, for instance, all men were created not 
only with the same faculties, but with all in precisely the same pro- 
portion ; if they were all moved by the same impulses, and chose 
the same pursuits ; if they were under the same conditions of 
wealth, civilization and general culture, and moreover being 
incapable of progress, continued age after age unchanged and 
unchangeable, we might then easily devise a system of instruc- 
tion which would never stand in need either of cultivation or 
improvement, but which, once established, would remain estab- 
lished forever. 

But, the reverse of all this is the truth. Though endowed 
with the same faculties, we perceive that these faculties are 
bestowed in different degrees and in unequal proportions. In 
one the faculty of observation predominates ; in another the sub- 
jective faculty. In one the reasonmg power is vigorous; in 
another, the power of combination. One is more capable of 
action; another of contemplation. In harmony with this differ- 
ence of endowment, we find the choice of pursuits among men 
extremely dissimilar. ‘This difference is necessary to the progress, 
nay, almost to the existence, of society. “If the whole body 
were an eye, where were the hearing. If the whole were 


hearing, where were the smelling.” 


Hence we find men every 
where addicting themselves to different departments of labor, 


and this bias frequently manifests itself in early youth. One 


32 


displays a taste for science, another for practice ; one chooses 
this branch of learning, and another that; one turns instinc- 
tively to the closet, another to the forum; one to the counting- 
room of the merchant, and another to the shop of the mechanic ; 
and we generally find that wherever a distinct love for any pur- 
suit exists, it is accompanied by those mental endowments which 
ultimately lead to success. 

But the external circumstances of men are dissimilar. In 
some circumstances wealth is much more universally diffused 
than in others, and hence the facilities for education are unlike. 
Government also exerts an acknowledged power in moulding the 
intellectual and social character of a people. The institutions 
of Turkey and those of Great Britam must create vast differ- 
ences in the mental habitudes of the people. ‘The amount of 
general knowledge which underlies the whole system of higher 
education, must greatly modify the form and proportions of the 
social edifice which we propose to erect upon it. Suppose a 
system of education had been devised for a nation before the 
invention of printing, how unsuitable would it prove for the peo- 
ple of this country at the present moment. It is, then, apparent, 
that in order to construct a system of education for any age or 
nation, the intellectual and social condition of that people must 
ever be kept in view. 

And it will at once appear that this remark applies with 
increased force, the higher we rise in our scale of instruction. 
The elementary branches of education must be the same for all. 
Ability to read is required by the emperor and the serf, and 
both must begin by learning the alphabet, and both must learn 
it in the same manner. Both, in order to arrive at the dignity 
of manhood, need to be taught to communicate their thoughts to 
others by writing, and both must begin with straight marks and 
pot-hooks. Both must be instructed in arithmetic, geography, 
and the correct use of their native language, and the teaching 


33 


- which is best for the one is best also for the other. In all this 
range of education, therefore, the ground 1s common for all. 

When, however, we proceed to the more advanced branches 
of education, the whole scene changes. The various depart- 
ments of science present themselves before us, too numerous by 
far, and too difficult of acquisition to be all embraced within the 
range of the education of any individual. A choice then becomes 
necessary, and this choice must be determined by the peculiar 
talent and bias of the pupil, the profession in life to which those 
views incline him, and for which they give him peculiar facili- 
ties. ‘These will also be varied by the social condition of a 
people, the amount of common education generally possessed, 
and the character of the government for which the higher edu- 
cation 1s designed. No system of education can suit the wants 
of a people which does not take distinctly into view all these 
elementary considerations. 

In speaking, then, of the system of collegiate instruction, or, 
that course of education which intervenes between a common 
school and the entrance upon the various occupations of life, we 
must first inquire what peculiarity may be observed in the condi- 
tion of the people of the United States, which should guide our 
judgments in this respect. 

In speaking upon this subject, I remark, in the first place, 
that the physical condition of the United States is, so far as I 
know, unparalleled in the history of man. 

The facilities which we enjoy for the universal acquisition of 
competence, nay, of wealth, are such as never before existed. 
Within the limits of the United States, stretching from the great 
Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific, 
there are millions of acres of as good land as the sun shines 
upon, which may be had almost for the asking. The govern- 
ment price of this land per acre, is about half a day’s wages of 
a journeyman mechanic. Much of it is of inexhaustible fertility, 

E 


D4 


covered, far beneath the reach of the plough, with the vegetable 
mould of centuries. It extends through the choicest portion of 
the temperate zone, and occupies every variety of situation. 
Hence it is adapted to all the staple productions demanded — 
either for the food or the clothing of man. Flax, hemp, cotton, 
and silk, here find soils and climate adapted to their most suc- 
cessful cultivation. Grains of every kind grow in abundance 
which might almost seem fabulous. Animal food fattens on the 
prairies and in the forest, without expense to the owner, and 
almost without his care. 

The mineral wealth of these regions is equally remarkable. 
Setting aside what are called the precious metals, which, by the 
way, I consider of very small value, we have here as rich mines 
of lead, copper and iron, as can be found on the face of the 
earth. Add to this the eastern portion of our western domain, 
is one inexhaustible coal basin, containing a richer supply of 
fuel than is contained in all the coal fields of the world beside. 

But the bounty of nature has not been exhausted by these 
munificent gifts. This whole region is amply supplied with 
rivers. ‘The invention of the steam engine has made these rivers 
navigable in every direction. A boat may ply from the Falls of 
St. Anthony to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the borders of 
Pennsylvania to the regions where the buffalo and the prairie 
dog hold almost undisputed possession. This coal region is 
specially intersected with navigable rivers. Hence our western 
states must be ere long the manufacturers for the world. Manu- 
factories always move towards the coal measures, and the vicinity 
of iron mines. ‘The branches of these mighty rivers will bring 
to them the raw material from the whole of that vast valley 
which stretches away between the Allegany and the Rocky | 
Mountains, and will either return the finished product to the 
place of its growth, or bear it to the seaboard, to supply with 
the means of comfort and convenience the millions of Europe. 


ah) ea 
DO 


But this is not all ‘The railroad has already penetrated all 
these regions, and is covering the west with a net-work of iron. 
A year or two since, and no one but the hunter, or the prospec- 
tor for lead, had ever visited the Falls of St. Anthony. A few 
weeks ago, fifteen hundred persons, men, women and remarkable 
children, made an excursion to this romantic locality, hearing at 
every step of their progress the throb of the steam chamber, or 
the whistle of the locomotive. Every product of this region 1s 
thus brought at once to the most profitable market, and bears a. 
price which compares with the price in cities. 

Of the enormous increase of wealth which has thus covered 
this country, we can form no adequate conception. Imagina- 
tion itself is staggered when the simple elements are placed 
before it. Let me offer a single illustration. When I was a 
student in this institution, and for some years afterwards, all the 
wheat arriving at Albany from the west, was transported on 
sleighs. I have seen them pass through this city in companies 
half a mile m length. The cost of transportation was so great, 
that, in the neighborhood of Geneva, the regular price of wheat 
was thirty-seven and a half cents a bushel. Farther west than 
this, the cost,of carriage reduced the price so low that it could 
not be raised with profit. ‘The price of land, of course, corre- 
sponded with that of its staple production. Cleveland and 
Chicago were then unknown, and the land on which they are 
built might have been purchased by the year’s wages of a 
respectable mechanic. West-of Buffalo, the whole earth was 
almost a terra incognita. 

A few years afterwards, the Erie Canal, that wonderful mon- 
ument to the genius, patriotism and statesmanship of DE Wirr 
CLINTON, @ name which I never pronounce without the profound- 
est emotions of veneration and gratitude, was opened. The 
next year wheat rose to sixty-two and a half cents per bushel. 
The following year it reached one dollar. From that time it 


36 


has never receded, and there have been times when even that 
price has been doubled. The value of land, of course, rose in 
proportion. 

The effect thus produced on this single State by the Hrie 
Canal, has been produced throughout our whole western country 
by the steamer and the locomotive. They bring the markets of 
the world to every man’s door, and, by reducing the price of 
transportation, place the largest share of profit in the hands of 
the immediate producer. Rapidity of transportation renders 
even the most perishable article every where marketable. ‘The 
prairie chickens of Illinois and Indiana are regularly for sale in 
the markets of Boston and New-York, and the cod and salmon 
of the Atlantic coast, smoke upon the tables of Cincinnati, Chi- 
cago and Indianapolis. 

Now, take as the element of your calculation, the change 
which I have spoken of in this State, and generalizing the idea, 
spread this effect over the immense regions of the west, and I 
ask, is it possible to estimate the increase of the wealth of the 
United States within the period of the last thirty years ? Ob- 
serve the cities that have become. the marts of trade for this vast 
region. ‘Their annual increase in wealth surpasses belief. Ob- 
serve the thousands of miles of railroad spreading in every 
direction, which are unable, as it would seem, to absorb our 
floating capital. Turn to the manufacturing cities and towns 
which are multiplying themselves by their own profits, on every 
river, and in the vicinity of every coal mme; and when you 
have added all this together, you will have formed but a most 
imperfect idea of the progress in wealth of this nation. 

It requires but a moment to show that all these changes tend 
to enrich not one class, but all classes. Universal and cheap 
means of transportation increase, as we have seen, the wealth of 
the producer. But they, at the same time, reduce the price of 
the product. As a day’s labor will purchase a larger amount 


or 
oe 


of flour, or clothmg, or animal food, the wages of the laborer are 
by just so much advanced. The immense emigration to the 
west, reduces the number of laborers at the east, and thus, the 
supply falling below the demand in all the older States, the price 
of labor is greatly augmented. Thus the laborer receives higher 
wages, and his wages are worth more than before. The im- 
mensely increasing reciprocal demand for the products of the 
east and the west, and the vast amount of exchanges by which 
this demand is supplied, render it possible for merchants and 
manufacturers to pay higher wages than before, and yet leave 
for themselves a profit that accumulates around them the wealth 
of princes. 

But another element here deserves aremark. Skill in inven- 
tion, united to the miraculous power of steam, 1s removing from 
human sinews the most laborious parts of every operation. Our 
forging and planing, our spinning and weaving, our mowing and 
reaping, and threshing, our transportation, both of men and of 
produce, is now all done by machinery, and generally driven by 
steam. In my youth, I have seen the labors of the hand-loom, 
and observed how a strong man toiled through a very long day 
at his slowly increasing work. A week since, I was passing 
through a cotton mill, and observed a young gil of ten or twelve 
years of age, attending upon five looms, and while domg what 
was formerly the work of ten men, she walked to and fro with 
an air of easy independence, which a lady at a reception might 
be well pleased to emulate. 

The result of all this it is very easy to perceive. God is thus 
lifting off from us that oppressive severity of toil which paralyzes 
intellect and benumbs the power of emotion. ‘The mind is thus 
rendered physically capable of thought and reflection. The rise 
in the rate of wages, the greater value of wages, and the dimin- 
ished number of hours of daily labor, are placing our whole 
population mm a condition for improvement such as no country 


38 


has ever before enjoyed. We see here a tendency to realize 
the beneficent designs of the Creator. It is evident that God 
intended all men to think, and to enjoy all the advantages of 
intellectual culture, for he has given to all men all the powers 
adapted to thought and culture. It is equally evident that he 
intended all men to labor, for labor is essential to physical health 
and enjoyment. And, moreover, men think the better for work- 
ing, and they work the better for thmking. He, however, never 
intended that labor should crush the power of thought. His 
design concerning us will not be accomplished, until every man 
shall be able to secure a competence by an amount of labor 
which shall leave his spiritual nature free and unembarrassed, 
nay, the better prepared for its work on account of the physical 
labor in which it has been engaged. 

The condition of this country looks towards the realization of 
this idea. In no country on earth has physical labor ever been 
so well remunerated. In no country has there ever been so 
universal an ability to acquire knowledge for ourselves, and 
bestow education on our children. Unless we are cursed with 
wicked counsels and inflamed with an insane love of conquest ; 
unless the public conscience 1s debauched by oppression and 
injustice, which corrupts at the core all generous public spirit; 
unless while we persuade ourselves that we are masters, we are 
degraded into slaves, we may hope to see in this country a popula- 
tion of which no philanthropist or statesman has ever formed a 
conception. 

I have spoken of our facilities of intercommunication. The 
effect of this element of our condition is deserving of a remark. 
We all speak the same language. We all are under the same 
government. There is not a man among us to whom every act 
of this government is not a matter of interest. But more than 
this: there is no part whatever of our country which is not con- 
nected by a thousand ties with every other part. A man can 


*) 
50 


travel in no direction over any State of the Union, without find- 
ing some of his former neighbors, to whom nothing is more grate- 
ful than information from the ancient homestead. The present 
facilities of intercourse cherish this interest, and keep it ever on 
the alert. The amount of personal communication between the 
various parts of our country is absolutely incalculable, especially 
between the east and the west, and particularly in the Free 
States. This facility of intercourse is immeasurably quickened 
by the lines of telegraph wire stretching in every direction, 
uniting every portion with every other, and with every part of 
the civilized world. 

The Atlantic steamer has not reached her berth, before the 
news which she brings is proclaimed in the streets of Cincinnati 
and St. Louis. The official signature is not dry upon a legislative 
act in any one of our States, before its provisions are pro- 
claimed from the shores of the Atlantic to the banks of the 
Missouri. A change in the price of any staple production 
- concerns every man in the community, and every man is anxious 
to satisfy himself on the subject. Thus the public mind is ever 
wakeful. Every man is continually forming judgments, true or 
false, but yet judgments, not only concerning the events in his 
own town or village, but events that are occurring throughout 
the Republic and the world. The effect of all this in diffusing a 
love of information, quickening mental energy, enlarging the 
breadth of generalization, and cultivating the love of progress, 
is too obvious to need illustration. The physical conditions of 
our country thus present as glorious a field in which to scatter 
broadcast the seeds of all knowledge, as the imagination of the 
philanthropic statesman ever conceived. 

Let us next inquire what is the educational character of our 
people. 

The Puritan ancestors of this country were men of whom the 
world was not worthy. England was sifted to furnish the seed 


40 


with which these Northern States were planted. They left 
their homes, and became the inhabitants of a wilderness, m 
obedience to moral principle. They sought for freedom to wor 
ship God. They established a civil society on the foundation of 
equal rights. ‘They well knew that equal rights could only be | 
secured on the basis of intelligence and virtue. Here, then, they 
laid the corner-stone of their social edifice. They determined 
that every citizen should be instructed in good learning, and be 
provided with the means of religious instruction. ‘They were 
well persuaded that a people nurtured under such auspices 
could never be either slaves or oppressors; for he who is 
intelligent and just, must love hberty, as well for his neighbor 
as for himself. ‘Their first care was, therefore, the establishment 
of schools for the whole community. 

As population multiplied and wealth mereased, their system 
of education expanded and improved. The schools have, in 
most of the States, been placed under legislative supervision. 
Private as well as public munificence, has added to their means 
of efficiency. Normal schools are scattering able and well 
instructed teachers throughout the land. Schools are liberally 
sustained by taxes imposed by the people on themselves. School 
districts are uniting to furnish themselves with instruction in the 
more advanced branches of learning. ‘There is no subject which 
calls forth a livelier interest, in any town in New-Hngland, 
than the advancement of knowledge. It banishes even poltical 
hostility, and men of all parties unite with each other in carrying 
forward a cause, on the success of which all that we hold valua- 
ble so essentially depends. In this good work, Massachusetts, 
by confession, takes the lead. Within a few years she has added 
to her ancient glory, by passing an act authorising every town 
to tax itself for the maintenance of a library; thus establishing 
the principle, that it is the duty of society not only to care for 
the imstruction of the mdividual, but also to provide the means 
for rendering this instruction in the highest degree valuable. 


+1 


The example of Massachusetts was early emulated by the 
States in her neighborhood, and thence the love of education 
has been disseminated over all the northern and western portions 
of the Union. The State of New-York, moved, I believe, by 
the venerable man, whose efforts in the cause of education we 
have met to celebrate, at an early period established a magnifi- 
cent fund for the support of public schools. It is cheerimg to 
observe the rapidity with which this spirit has been diffused 
throughout the Western States. I believe that the man is still 
living who erected the first cabin on the spot now known as the 
-¢ity of Cincinnati. At the present moment, the provisions of 
Ohio for common school education are inferior to none in our 
country, and the schools of the Queen City of the West do not 
decline a comparison with those of any city in the land. 

The influence of these examples has pervaded the general 
government itself. Hence, in the organization of the new States, 
if I do not misremember, provision is always made for public 
education, by reserving large tracts of land to be forever appro- 
priated to this purpose. A permanent foundation is thus laid 
for the universal education of the people. Some of this land 
has been appropriated to university education, and hence a pro- 
vision is made for the establishment of seats of learning, in what 
was very lately a wilderness, which will vie in extent and mag- 
nificence with those in any part of the world. 

The result of all this may be easily imagined. A common 
school education, good now, and every year growing better, is 
placed within the reach of every child in the older Free States, 
and in the new States where it is not rendered impracticable by 
sparseness of population; and of these advantages the people 
very generally avail themselves. Reading and writing, and the 
ordinary branches of school education, are the acquisition of 
every child. Even among our English ancestors, formerly, I 
might almost say now, these were rare accomplishments which con- 

F 


40 


ferred on their possessor an enviable distinction. Among us, 
they have long since ceased to be a distinction, while to be unable 
to read or write is an acknowledged disgrace. When a man 
cannot sign his name, it is taken for granted that he is not a 
native-born American. 

The result of all this has been that, at the present moment, 
there are probably more readers of the English language in the 
United States than in all the world beside. Instead of bemg 
merely a province, we are becoming the chief seat of the Anglo- 
Saxon nation. If I remember correctly, Macaulay’s History of 
England had not been published six months, before ten times as 
many copies had been printed in this country as in England. 
Long before this time, I presume that this disproportion has 
been doubled. It has been printed in every variety of form, as 
cheap as twenty-five cents a volume, thus showing that its circula- 
tion penetrated every rank of society. The same fact is illustrated 
by the vast number of newspapers published in this country. 
Every man reads them, and every man whom you meet is 
acquainted with the news of the day. The increasing amount 
of authorship is an indication of the same character. A large 
proportion of this authorship, moreover, proceeds from persons 
who have received no aid from collegiate education. The 
remark of Horace is specially true of us; docti et indoctihe 
might have said, indoctee—scribmus. A large number of our 
most acceptable writers are women, who are excluded from our 
colleges. A very respectable periodical was for some time, I 
know not but it is still, conducted by the factory girls at Lowell. 
Such facts as these indicate the extent and the excellence of 
the education which is offered freely to every young person 
among us. ‘The intellectual culture of Americans who labor 
has been frequently remarked by intelligent foreigners. To this 
they have ascribed our unparalleled progress in the arts. The 
best’ English writers on this subject, at the present day, urge 


45 


this as a reason why education, and good education, should be 
universally diffused among the working classes at home. They 
acknowledge us to be their rivals in all the useful arts, and they 
confess that they must be distanced in the race, unless they can 
elevate the standard of intellectual attainment in their people, 
to a level with our own. 

When we speak of higher, or, as it is called, collegiate edu- 
cation, we mean that course of instruction which begins when 
common or school education ends. Now I ask, in view of these 
facts, when did a people exist that ever presented such a field 
- for this kind of instruction? When the whole mass of mind is 
thus quickened, remarkable talents, those endowments which 
God has bestowed for the good ef the whole, cannot but display 
themselves. What we seem specially to need, is the means of 
developing such talent in every direction, so that not one of these 
special gifts of God may be lost. Distinguished talent for any 
thing, is one of the most signal blessings ever bestowed upon 
- man, and we are false to ourselves, and ungrateful to our Crea- 
tor, if we do not improve it all, and improve it to the uttermost. 

I will mention only one other peculiarity of the condition of 
this country: it is that our institutions are in every respect 
thoroughly democratic. 

Democracy supposes that the object of society is simple, that 
it is to confirm every man in the enjoyment of all the means of 
happiness bestowed upon him by his Creator. It takes it for 
granted that every man has a right to himself, and to all the 
innocent results of the use of his faculties. The object of society, 
and of government which is its agent, is to guarantee to every 
individual the full [possession of this right. This obligation, in 
the formation of a civil polity, men mutually assume towards 
each other. ‘This, then, is the essential limit of the power of 
society over the individual. If, for mutual convenience, any 
other power is entrusted to society, it is always done on the con- 


44 


dition that it be exercised for the good of every member equally, 
for all the members being equal, no power can be rightly exerted 
for the benefit of the one, unless it be also exercised for the 
benefit of all. " 

Beyond this, democratic society does not interfere. It leaves 
the individual to work out his own destiny for himself. Every 
man is thus made the architect of his own fortune. If he suc- 
ceed, he alone is entitled to the advantages of his success. If 
he fail, it is the result of his own voluntary action, for which he 
has no one to blame but himself. Every individual is allowed 
to pursue his own happiness, in his own way, and all that society 
does is to protect him from the interference of his neighbor. If 
it ever attempts to confer any aid, it confers it equally upon all, 
knowing no distinction between the high or low, the rich or poor; 
but looking upon them all from one single point of view, that is, 
as members of the society. 

The responsibility of every individual’s success or failure, is 
thus thrown wholly upon himself. Hence arises the intense 
activity which pervades republican institutions. Every motive 
power has free and unembarrassed action. Universal competi- 
tion gives intensity to every effort. Hvery inducement is spread 
before every individual to benefit his condition by every means 
in his power. The spirit pervades the whole social mass. Every 
atom becomes vital. LHvery man has a distinet object to be 
accomplished, and he knows that it can be accomplished only by 
putting forth all the power with which he has been endowed. 
To this we owe that self-reliance and adaptation to every condi- 
tion which is said to distinguish our countrymen. Go where you 
will, from the equator to the pole, you will every where find the 
representatives of the “‘ Universal Yankee Nation,” and you will 
generally find them intelligent, enterprizing, laborious, and there- 
fore successful. 


45 


Now, it can scarcely have escaped the notice of such a people, 
that the practice of every art depends for success on a knowledge 
of some social or physical law. Knowledge, to every intelli- 
gent man, is emphatically power. If he fail m any art, he 
knows that it must have been because he has violated some law; 
if he succeed, it must be because he has obeyed it. To such a 
community knowledge is then a matter of imperative necessity. 
This is the very element of success. Without it, mless by acci- 
dent, man must labor in vain, and consume his capital without 
remuneration. Hence, it may readily be believed that such a 
people would eagerly desire that physical knowledge, on which 
all success in the useful arts depends, as well as that other 
spiritual knowledge which:the human mind instinctively craves, 
as soon as its energies are aroused, and the true and the beau- 
tiful are brought within its field of vision. 

That such is becoming rapidly the tendency of this country, 
must, I think, be evident. It is obvious from the wonderful 
development of the talent for invention, for which we are remark- 
able. It is shown in the earnest endeavor to improve our school 
system, to which I have already alluded. Itis proved by the 
immense sums, bestowed in every part of our land, for the endow- 
ment of institutions of learning; a very large part of which is 
* given by men who have acquired their wealth by the labor of 
their hands. If it be said that, after all, the men who avail 
themselves of the laws of nature in their daily pursuits, do not 
resort to our colleges, the reply is easy. We may well ask, if 
they resorted thither would they find what they wanted? Our 
teaching of nature’s laws is designed not for men who expect to 
use their knowledge, but for those who expect immediately to 
forget it. Let, however, instruction be given, adapted to the 
wants of the community, on any scientific subject, and the in- 
structor, wherever he can find men, will rarely want for hearers. 


46 


Such, then, is the condition of our people. We have a popu- 
lation increasing in wealth with a rapidity wholly unprecedented. 
The intellect of this people is aroused to action by the means 
universally provided for common school education. ‘This awak-: 
ened intellect is stimulated to uncommon activity by the legitimate 
effects of the democratic principle. Now, can a philanthropist, 
a patriot, or a statesman, hesitate for a moment, when he is 
called upon to determine the principles by which the higher edu- 
cation of such a people should be governed ? 

Shall we, having educated the whole people up to a certain 
point, giving to all equal advantages for self-development, then 
reverse our whole system, and bestow the advantages of higher 
education only upon a few. Shall we say that the lawyer, and 
physician, and clergyman, need a knowledge of principles in 
order to pursue their callings with success, while the farmer, the 
mechanic, the manufacturer, and the merchant, require no know- 

ledge of the laws upon which the success of every operation 
which they perform depends. Shall we say that we need a 
literary class of men, and for the education of these we will make 
ample provision, while for all the rest it makes no manner of dif- 
ference whether they be thoughtful, independent and self-reli- 
liant, or nothing but mere hewers of wood and drawers of water. 
Shall we say that intellect is to be cultivated and talent devel- 
oped in one direction alone, or developed in every possible direc- 
tion? I cannot conceive it possible for American citizens to 
hold any divided opinion on this subject. He would certainly — 
be a rare man who would openly contend for such a distinction 
as these questions suppose. We are all equal. We are all left 
each one for himself to work out his own destiny, and to make 
provision for those that shall come after him. very one needs 
knowledge, knowledge of the laws which shall command success 
in his own avocation, very one needs that knowledge which 
shall enable him to form correct judgments, and all men need it 


AT 


equally. Wherever a provision is made for education by private 
munificence, all men may reasonably expect to share it without 
distinction; where provision is made by the public, they may 
rightfully demand it. Nothing can be conceived of, more diame- 
trically opposed to the first principles of our government, than 
to impose a tax upon the whole, and then appropriate it to the 
benefit of a part. 

But it will, I presume, be answered, that I am contending 
where there is no adversary; that all our institutions of learning 
are equally open for all, and that all men may avail themselves 
of their advantages if they be so disposed. All this I grant. 
But I ask for whom were our present systems of collegiate 
education devised ?—for the few or for the many? They were 
originally designed exclusively for the clergy, and in the father- 
land they have been perpetuated for the clergy and the aristo- 
eracy. ‘They are, in this country, devised mainly for the profes- 
sions, and their success is measured by their results upon the 
professions. The learning which they cultivate is in kind and 
amount measured by the demands of the professions. But I 
ask, as I have done before, have not the mechanic and the mer- 
chant, the farmer and the manufacturer, as much need of know- 
ledge, each in his own profession, as the lawyer, the minister, 
and the physician. Have they not as just a claim on the 
money taken from their own earnings, as those classes which 
have been so exclusively favored. May they not then justly 
demand that not only education in higher knowledge shall be 
provided for them, but that it shali be education of which they 
may profitably avail themselves; so that they may enter upon 
their career in life, under as favorable auspices as those who 
prefer what are sometimes called the literary professions. 

It would seem then that, in devising a system of higher educa- 
tion for our country, we should commence with the self-evident 
maxim, that we are to labor not for the benefit of one but of all ; 


48 


not for a caste, or a clique, but for the whole community. Pro- 
ceeding upon this ground, we should provide the instruction 
needed by every class of our fellow-citizens. Wherever an 
institution is established in any part of our country, our first 
inquiry should be, what is the kind of knowledge (in addition 
to that demanded for all) which this portion of our people needs, 
in order to perfect them in their professions, give them power 
over principles, enable them to develop their intellectual resour- 
ces and employ their talents to the greatest advantage for them- 
selves and for the country. ‘This knowledge, whatever it may 
be, should be provided as liberally for one class as for another. 
Whatever is thus taught, however, should be taught, not only 
with the design of increasing knowledge, but also of giving 
strength, enlargement and skill to the original faculties of the 
soul. When a system of education formed on these principles 
shall pervade this country, we may be able to present to the 
world the legitimate results of free institutions; by pursuing 
any other career we may render them a shame and a by-word. 
Who can fail to see that the universal dissemination of the 
most valuable knowledge is imperatively demanded by the pre- 
sent condition of our country. We possess a territory of bound- 
less extent, embracing every variety of soil. This immense 
domain can never be taught to yield its richest and most abun- 
dant products, until the knowledge of vegetable and animal 
physiology, the chemical constituents of soils, meteorology, and — 
physical geography shall have been made the common property 
of all our citizens. The mineral wealth of all this region is yet 
unknown, except in those localities where it has obtruded itself 
upon the surface. Scientific mining and geology can alone 
reveal to us the treasures which lie beneath the soil, warning us 
against absurd explorations, and pointing out to us the spots 
where our labors will be rewarded with abundant success. To 
accomplish this result, however, it will not be sufficient to teach 


49 


merely such an amount of physical science as may be required 
by a lawyer or clergyman ; but these departments must be ele- 
vated into thorough courses of study, designed for and adapted 
to the wants of those who need their aid in advancing the mate- 
rial progress of our country. 

But, after all, the most valuable treasures which God bestows 
upon every country is found in the spiritual nature of man. Dis- 
tinguished talent, if it be only guided by virtue, is the richest gift 
which is ever lavished upon a nation. Native talent is probably 
given in larger measure to those who labor (provided their labor 
is not exhausting and brutalizing) than to othermen. Hence it 
is, that, in revolutions, when great ability 1s required, it is gener- 
ally found to exist in the middle classes. Physical labor culti- 

-vates mental energy, resolution, and self-reliance; all prime ele- 
ments in the formation of eminent character. It is from this 
range of condition that invention generally proceeds, that won- 
derful talent which, within the last century, has wrought so 
mighty changes in the aspects of civilization. From the minds 
of Watt, ARKWRIGHT, and STEPHENSON, have originated those 
combinations that have opened so glorious a path for the progress of 
humanity. In our own country, the wonderful increase of the cot- 
ton culture, and the incidental and fearful growth of the slave 
power, is all to be ascribed to the cotton-gin of Hit Wurtney. It 
is to the genius of FuLTon that we owe the development of the 
mighty west; and the transfer of the dominion of this country 
from the eastern to the western slope of the Alleghanies. We 
have now the most intelligent and self-reliant mechanics on 
earth. We need nothing more than to spread a knowledge of 
the laws of nature among those who daily, without knowing how, 
put them in practice, to give this country unapproachable prece- 
dence in the useful arts. The results of this universal diffusion 
of knowledge, upon science, literature and discovery, are obvi- 
ous; but my limits do not allow me to treat of them in detail, 

G 


a 


DY 


The present is a most auspicious moment in which to take 
this subject into full consideration. There seems a fatal ten- 
dency, in the formation of systems of education, blindly to fol- 
low precedents, without examining the laws on which they are 
founded, or the results which they have attained. The west, m 
organizing its institutions, looks backward to the east, and con- 
siders its labor perfected when it has copied the universal model, 
We of the east, as far as public opinion will permit, have imi- 
tated Cambridge and Oxford, without considering how utterly 
unsuited to our condition must be institutions founded for the 
education of the mediceval clergy, and modified by the pressure 
of an all-powerful aristocracy. But the spirit of reform, origin- 
ating from without, is already transforming these venerable seats 
of learning, It is confessed that they are wholly unadapted to 
meet the wants of the Great Britain of the present, and the 
nation insists that their character must be changed. They must 
be open to all, and they must teach the knowledge which Eng- 
land needs. Such are the demands of humanity, and these 
demands must be satisfied. Is it not becoming in us to follow 
this example? Is it not imperative on us to set an example foy 
ourselves? In a free country like our own, unembarrassed by 
precedents, and not yet entangled by the vested rights of by- 
gone ages, ought we not to originate a system of education 
which shall raise to high intellectual culture the whole mass 
of our people? When our systems of education shall look with 
as kindly an eye on the mechanic as the lawyer, on the manu- 
facturer and merchant as the minister; when every artizan, per- 
forming his process with a knowledge of the laws by which it is 
governed, shall be transformed from an unthinking laborer into 
a practical philosopher; and when the benign principles of 
Christianity shall imbue the whole mass of orr people with the 
spirit of universal love, then, and not till then, shall we illustrate 
to the nations the blessings of Republican and Christian Institu- 
tions, 


5 


You all perceive that the line of remark which I have here 
pursued, has been suggested by the circumstances of the present 
memorable occasion. An aged man, the Nestor of American 
teachers, finds himself this day surrounded by pupils who have 
assembled from every State in our Union, to offer him their filial 
congratulations. An officer of instruction, who has for half a 
century presided over a most flourishing seat of learning, is here 
met by the thousands who have returned to the home of their 
education, to declare that whatever of success they have achieved 
in their several professions, has been greatly owing to the wis- 
dom of his precepts and the purity of his example. He who, 
while discharging with unrivalled ability the duties of the lecture 
room, and watching with parental solicitude over the individual 
development of every pupil committed to his charge, has yet 
found time, by masterly skill, to accumulate a fund which must 
render Union College the most favored institution in our country, 
has this year completed his labor, and has laid this magnificent 
offering on the altar of public education. While for fifty years 
distributing gratuitous instruction with profuse liberality, he has 
been also providing the means for a wider and richer distribution 
of its blessings for all coming time. A benignant Providence 
has spared that honored life, and crowned those labors with tri- 
umphant success; and now a whole community, uttering the 
voice of humanity, has assembled to bow in grateful reverence 
before that hoary head which, for half a century, has been encir- 
cled with the wreath of profound learning, matchless sagacity, 
unwearied benevolence, surpassing eloquence, and childlike 
piety. The youth and the age of the present seem here to 
unite with the coming generations of the future, and shower 
on the head of that “‘old man eloquent”’ their selectest bene- 
dictions. 

Venerable man! We rejoice to see that thine eye is not dim, 
though thy natural force is somewhat abated. We thank you 


52 


for your care over our youth; we thank you for those counsels 
which have so often guided our manhood; we thank you for that 
example which has ever so clearly pointed out to us the path of 
earnest duty and self-forgetful charity. Long may you yet live 
to witness the happmess which you have created, and cherish 
the genius which your inspirations first awakened to conscious 
existence. And when the Saviour, in whose footsteps you have 
trodden, shall call thee home to receive thy reward, may death 
lay his hand gently on that venerated form, and gently quiet the 
pulsations of that noble heart. May thy fainting head recline 
upon the bosom of the Redeemer whom thou hast loved; may 
thine eye open upon visions of glory which man may not utter ; 
and so may an entrance be abundantly administered to thee into 
the joy of thy Lord. Heaven will account itself richer, as it 
opens its pearly gates to welcome thy approach; but where shall 
those who survive find anything left on earth that resembles 
thee ? | 


On the conclusion of President WayLanp’s discourse, the meeting 
adjourned ; and re-assembled at 2 o’clock P. M., to hear Dr. Norr’s 
Address to his old Pupils. 


DR. NOTT’S ADDRESS. — 


é = 


Dk. NOTTS ADDRESS, 


Firty years ago, having been charged with the supervision of 
Union College, I stood for the first time on yon rising grounds 
where the college edifices now stand. 

The same range of western hills, the same intervening luxuri- 
ant flats, and the same quiet river, winding through fields of 
grain whitening for the harvest, then met the eye; the same 
starry firmament overspread by night, and the same glorious 
sunlight rendered visible by day, in its general outline, the whole 
lovely Valley of the Mohawk. 

The immediate college grounds, however, now so symmetrical 
and ornate, were then mere pasture grounds, scarred by deep 
ravines, rendered at once unsightly and difficult of access by an 
alternation of swamp and sand hill, and the whole divided into 
numerous irregular compartments, in evidence of different own- 
ership. As yet, neither shrub nor tree had been planted, walk 
traced, garden laid out, or edifice erected thereon. Some forty 
students, scattered over the then village of Schenectady, meeting 
for educational purposes, in what is now a cabinet-maker’s shop, 
with a single professor, was the whole of Union College. And 
yet Union College was then the only existing college out of the 
city of New-York, and the village of Schenectady was, in a 
literary point of view, among the most favored localities in the 
State, for an academy had previously existed there. 


‘56 


With the exception of grants to King’s (now Columbia) Col- 
lege, previous to the Revolution, public benefactions to science 
had been few and far between. For academic instruction a 
stinted provision only had been made: for the masses, none.” 
And so entire was the despair of the Trustees of Union College, 
of further aid from the State, that when, on the event of the 
speaker’s election to the presidency, it was proposed to petition 
the legislature for such aid, the board refused to authorize the 
application, on the ground that if made it would be hopeless. 

¢ was made, however,—made on the sole responsibility of the 
President; and to the honor of that legislature — the legislature 
of 1804-5 —it was not made in vain. 

Nor, previous to 1804, had the provision made for trade 
or travel, or for many other of man’s social wants, been more 
liberal or effective. Great progress indeed had previously been 
made in many of the arts, both useful and ‘ornamental, and in 
both hemispheres. 

To say nothing of the rock-excavated dwellings at Petrea, 
the pyramidal piles of Egypt, or the deserted ruins of Baalbec, 
all which bespeak the triumphs of man over nature ; but to say 
nothing of these, and though all else of Greece had perished, 
her memory would be eternized by the life-like forms transferred 
to the canvas by the pencil of APELLES, and wrought out from 
the marble by the chisel of PHIDIAS. 

Faust had already revealed the art of embodying in visible 
signs the creations of mind, and of giving to these signs an en- 
during form and a world-wide circulation. Bacon had taught — 
the mariner, in the absence of sun and stars, to guide, with 
unerring certainty, his bark across the ocean; and even our own 
FRANKLIN had disarmed the muttering thunder of its bolt, and 
freed mankind from the terror of its menace. 


* See Appendix (A.) 


~~ 
| 


Stil, fifty years ago, chemistry was little known ; steam, as a 
motive power on the land or on the water, was less known; and 
electricity, though disarmed of its terrors, had been applied to 
no useful purpose. 3 , 

Then» by the power of muscle, or of wind, and in wagons, or 
row-boats, or shallops, the internal commerce of the entire coun- 
try was carried on. ‘Then, to visit Albany, do business and 
return, usually required three days; New-York often three 
weeks, and Buffalo six. Then, a voyage even to Whitesborough, 
performed in the use of the oar or the setting-pole, oceupied 
more time, and exposed to greater dangers, than a voyage now 
across the ocean. 

Then, Rome was the mercantile metropolis of the west; nor, 
beyond Rome, except with savages, did commerce exist. Be- 
yond Rome, the ploughshare of the husbandman had scarcely 
disturbed the soil, or the axe of the woodman indented the 
forest. The great west, the glorious west, was a mere lair for 
_ the wild beast, and a hunting-ground for the savage. Through 
all its forest depths the war-whoop echoed, and over all its inland 
waters the bark eanoe floated in token of the red man’s sove- 
reignty. 

Then, even in the older States, the savage and the wild beast 
lingered, and in all of them the husbandman, in the use of the 
sickle, the flail and the fan, by hand, replenished his granary ; 
the housewife, in the use of the wheel and the shuttle, by hand, 
converted the flax and the fleece into raiment; and the boat- 
man, in the use of the oar and the setting-pole, urged forward, 
by hand, his little river craft against the current. 

Now, how changed. The foot, and the hand wheel, and the 
hand loom, have been exchanged for the power loom and the 
spinning jenny ; the oar and the setting-pole laid aside, and the 
steam engine substituted. Nor the oar and the setting-pole 
only. Labor by human hands has been gradually disappearing 

H 


D8 


from the factory and the field, and machinery taking its place. 
The ploughshare, and the scythe, and the sickle, and the rake, 
driven by steam, now move with precision and dispatch across 
the prairie, the meadow and the harvest field; and in a thousand 
ways, both indoors and out, processes are now rapidly executed 
by steam which, fifty years ago, were performed—and tardily 
performed —only by human hands. 

Propelled by this new agency, steamships visit the seaports of 
the old world, penetrate the interior of the new, and, laden with 
the products of both, gladden human hearts as they ascend, for 
thousands of miles, the Mississippi, the Ohio, the Missouri rivers 
—rivers whose banks are now studded with cities and thronged 
by citizens, but which, fifty years ago, were trodden only by the 
foot of the hunter and the savage. Artificial channels for com- 
merce, even, have been excavated around the falls of the Hud- 
son, the Mohawk, the Niagara, and the Sault of the St. Mary’s, 
connecting the waters of the Champlain, the Ontario, the Erie, 
the Huron, the Michigan, the Superior, and even of the Lake 
of the Woods, with the waters of the ocean. | 

Suddenly, villages have sprung up, a numerous and busy 
population has assembled, and the hum of industry is heard on 
both sides of those channels, whose waters are destined to bear 
upon their bosom the products of countries more rich in resources 
than Britain, and greater in extent than the entire of Europe. 

On the land, as well as on the water, steam has been intro- 
duced as the chief motive power. To facilitate its introduction, 
hills have been depressed or perforated, vallies raised, and 
graded pathways and embedded rails provided. Along these 
lines of travel, in place of the mail coach lumbering through 
mud and mire, in the use of horse power coerced by the 
lash, there may now be seen and heard the breathing, 
screaming, self-moving locomotive with its train of railroad cars, 
dashing forward by day and by night alike, and for thousands 


59 


of miles in continuity, without rest or respite, and with the speed 
of the eagle. Nor has even this eagle speed satisfied the de- 
mands of an eager, restless, enterprising, impetuous age. Hence, 
along these same lines of travel, the lightnings harnessed have 
been trained with lightning speed to transmit intelligence, and 
even to become a stationary medium, through which friends, 
whatever the intervening distance, exchange salutations, and 
commune and converse together as if standing face to face. 

Light, too, as well as lightning, has been put in requisition, 
and trained to perform man’s labor and do his bidding. The 
impassioned artist indeed still sits before the canvas on his easel, 
and labors to perfect the outline he has traced there ; but his 
art has been transferred from the studio, and the lifelike form 
and feature, in place of being progressively brought forth by 
touches of the pencil, are instantly perfected by the imprint of 
the sunbeam. 

This employment of fire, and steam, and lightning, and sun- 
beams, in carrying forward those processes which the wants of the 
world require, is more than the mere substitution of elemental 
for muscular power: it is the increase of power itself in its appli- 
cation tothe production of useful effect. For, by this substitu- 
tion, the horse is not only unloosed from the mail coach, the 
weaver dismissed from the hand loom, the spinster from the 
spinning wheel, and the painter from his studio, but the pro- 
cesses severally performed by these several agents are performed 
by the elements substituted with a perfection and a dispatch 
which could never have been equalled in the use of man power, 
or the power of animals, however applied, or to whatever extent 
increased. 

Hence that marvellous multiplication of comforts and accu- 
mulation of capital, which has been so suddenly produced. 

Young as our country is, and imperfectly as its resources 
have been developed, the mere day laborer here is better fed, 


HO 


and clothed, and lodved, than the aristocracy of England were 
two centuries ago. 

In the meantime, and while comforts have been thus mncreas~ 
ing, emigration with its progressive flow, has borne forward —1n 
narrow channels, I admit, —still it has borne forward arts, and 
science, and civilization, the common law, the English lancuage, 
and the Christian religion, from the Atlantic States to the 
mountain, nay, to the ocean barrier of the far-off west. — 

Whence these triumphs? What has produced in a time so 
short a change so wonderful? Mind: free, educated, Christian 
mind. ‘This favored land is at once a land of freedom and of 
Bibles; and a land of freedom because a land of Bibles. The 
world over, where the Bible is read, man is free; where the 
Bible is not read, oppression reigns. 

Time was, (and still is elsewhere, ) when to individual man it 
was not permitted to think, or believe, or act on his own respon- 
sibility. Independent thought was a prerogative of government; 
but the masses, were required to think as the ruling power, 
(whether priest or potentate,) thought, and to believe as the rul- 
ing power believed, and to act as it commanded. ‘To compel and 
perpetuate this passivity on the part of the masses, the rack, the 
gibbet and the faggot were employed; to escape which the 
Pilgrim Fathers forsook country and home, and fled to savage 
hordes and forest wilds. 

The Revolution which followed sundered these bonds, by 
which tyrants had so long sought to bind the free soul blindly, 
and notwithstanding its revoltings, to the altar and the throne. 

This successful resistance marked a new era in the history of 
the race. 

The masses, disenthralled, became individualized, and millions 
of minds, thus re-energised, began to think, and believe, and 
decide for themselves. Suddenly, individual opinion became 
everywhere apparent. Individual opinion, aggregated, formed 


61 


a public opinion—the opinion of the masses; which opimion, 
legalized and called into action, formed a new element in the 
government of nations, an element destined to absorb all 
other elements, and to become itself the governing principle of 
the race. 

It is yet indeed in its inception ; but when more fully enlight- 
ened by science and sanctified by grace, it shall, in its strength 
and its universality, be fully enthroned, the voice of power will 
no longer be sent down to the people from the usurper’s hated 
guarded palace, but sent up by the people to the seat of empire. 
Then, at the utterance of that voice, thrones will crumble, 
dynasties be changed, armies be disbanded, oppression cease, 
and a bloodless revolution carried around the world. 

Already, at its bidding, and within the same last half century, 
has the common school system been adopted, and the school 
master commissioned and sent abroad to instruct, with one hu- 
miliating exception, the children of all the races which, in the ~ 
providence of God, have been congregated in the Empire State. 
More than this: throughout the other States, within the same 
half century, the union of Church and State has been forever 
annulled; so that no stereotyped sectarian articles of faith or 
form of worship are any longer legalized in any part of republi- 
can America. On the contrary, the books of natural and 
revealed religion, without note or comment, are left open for all 
to read and interpret, and each in virtue of his own inherent 
right, is left free to worship the God of his fathers according to 
the dictates of his individual conscience. 

Within the same half century, public opinion has ameliorated 
and improved, as well as extended, our educational systems. 
In the common school, the rod and the ferule have been 
exchanged for the plaudit and the premium. The school house, 
rendered alluring by charts, and maps, and apparatus, and evo- 
lutions, has ceaséd to be a prison house; and study, in place of 


% 


62 


being a task coerced by the lash, has become a boon conferred 
as a privilege. 

As auxiliary to the free school, is the free press, which, with 
its trained corps of editors, and reporters, and printers, is send- 
ing forth daily its magnificent sheets, the vehicles of intelligence, 
and learning, and eloquence, and morals, and religion, and scat- 
tering them broadcast with a rapidity, and over an extent of 
country that astonishes. 

The college, also liberalized, and adapted to the wants of a 
young and free country, and a progressive age, invites to its con- 
secrated halls our youth ;* and Jast and best, the Church, reared 
not by tribute extorted by the tax gatherer, but by the free-will 
offermg of grateful hearts, stands pointing by its spires the 
eye of the beholder heavenward during the week days, and 
inviting with open door the whole population to the worship of 
Jehovah on the Sabbath. 

Surely our lines have fallen in pleasant places, we have a 
goodly heritage. 

But where are the actors in these scenes of glory ‘— the men 
who achieved these semi-centennial triumphs ?— especially those 
of the Empire State ?— where are the statesmen ?— where is JAY, 
and CLinton, and Hamitton—statesmen of imperishable me- 
mory ? 

Where are the jurists ?— where is the stern and incorruptible 
SPENCER, the erudite, guileless KENT, and the eloquent and per- 
suasive VAN NEss? 

Where are the mventors, and the patrons of inventors ?— 
where is the liberal and enlightened Lirvinaston ?—the ingen- 
ious and successful FuLTon? and, above all, where is the un- 
honored and forgotten Frrou, the real and the unrivalled author 
of steamboat navigation ? 


* See Appendix (B.) 


05 

Where are the men that presided over this institution in its 
early infancy ?’— where is the devout and impassioned Situ ? 
—the acute and polemic Epwarps ?—and where the elegant 
and accomplished Maxcy ? 

Where the teachers that constituted its faculty ?— where is 
the profound Van Der Huvuvat ?—the beloved Taytor ?— the 
devoted Yates ?—the learned ALLEN, and the venerated 
Davis ? 

Where are the men that constituted its board of trustees ?— 
where is VAN RENSSELAER, and Banyar, ‘and Henry, and 
OotnouT, and Yates, and Duane? and especially where is 
Romnyn, and Coz, and BLAtcHFoRD ?—venerable names. 
Where? Gone—all gone; and I stand here alone to-day 
among you, beloved pupils, the last remaining relic of a former 
age, as the leafless, storm-stricken forest tree stands amid trees 
of younger growth, still spreading around their branches, breast- 
ing the storm, and rejoicing in their strength. 

But though I stand thus, and though saddening reminiscences 
force themselves on the mind, the present gathering is rather an 
occasion. of joy than sorrow. 

From the long, expensive and painful ordeal through which 
the College has been compelled to pass, it has come forth with 
ample means of usefulness, and an unsullied reputation. Thank- 
ful for the fidelity of friends, especially thankful to that generous, 
intrepid and untiring advocate, who, unsolicited, and without the 
promise or prospect of reward, devoted for so long a time the 
whole energy of his powerful mind to the unravelling of that 
triple web of false facts, misstatements and false reasoning, 
which, during so many years, and with such untiring assiduity, 
misguided men had been weaving; above all, thankful to God 
that the lives of so many of those best acquainted with the facts 
in question have been spared, till, in his good providence, the 
truth has been made apparent, and the victory won ; thankful for 


64 


this, let us forgive and forget the past, and, cherishing the hope 
that the grievous injustice we have suffered has been the result 
of misapprehension, rather than of malice, let us exercise only 
good will towards those who have done us wrong. Forgiveness 
befits creatures who themselves must ask of God forgiveness. 
To forgive is but to anticipate that frame of mind in which we 
must all desire that death should find us, that so we may leave 
the world as Christians ought to leave it, at peace with God and 
in charity with all men. 

We have spoken of the past, of the present; but what of the 
future ¢ 

Our predecessors, as we have seen, especially our immediate 
predecessors, have conceived nobly and executed much. And 
for this we do honor to their memories. But after all, the much 
they have executed only reveals the more that remains to be 
executed. Mighty enterprizes have been undertaken, vast 
works commenced, experiments full of promise are in progress ; 
but nothing as yet has been perfected. Even from the forests 
of the west, that glorious west of which we have spoken, our 
predecessors have done little more than prune away on the out- 
skirts a few branches in different localities, and thus let mn the 
sunlight, giving the beholder glimpses merely of that vast, rich, 
variegated national domain which God has given us to inherit. 

Nor elsewhere, nor in any other direction, has the “ ideal 
finale ’’ been reached. Progression indeed is everywhere appa- 
rent. ‘Excelsior’ is stamped on the entire inheritance be- 
queathed us: “ It is finished” on nothing. - 

The present is but the infancy of the Republic, nay, of the 
race itself. We stand at the mere vestibule of the era of human 
improvement. 

The realization of human hope, and the fulfilment of human 
destiny, are yet seen only in the distance. ‘The first pages only © 
in the history of man’s doimgs on the earth, have as yet been 


65 


written. The residue remains to be filled with triumphs to be 
achieved during the days, and years, and ages of his predicted 
glorious future. Nor will the last page in that forthcoming 
volume be inscribed till the action of fire, and flood, and storm, 
as well as steam and lightning, shall be understood and controll- 
ed; till the husbandman shall be able to protect his vineyard and 
his harvest field against the desolations of the hail storm; the sea- 
man to elude the violence of the tempest ; and the chemist, with 
his furnace and his crucible, to effect those changes in the form 
and qualities of bodies, which God now effects with so much ease, 
and in a manner to us so incomprehensible, in his own vast labo- 
ratory ; till oppression shall cease, misery be alleviated, peace 
restored, and the reign of Immanuel established in every realm, 
and among every race of this sin-cursed earth. 

** Coming events cast their shadows before” them, and that 
such is God’s ultimate design, is alike indicated by prophecy 
and Providence. 

This progress of science, this improvement in the physical, is 
but the preparation and the prelude to a still more glorious im- 
provement in the moral condition of man. 

God, all powerful though he is, executes his purposes im this 
world, and probably in all worlds, through the instrumentality 
of created agents. Without this he could have supplied the 
wants of man. He could have caused the earth to bring forth 
without the planting and watering of the husbandman. He 
could have supplied the manufactured article as easily as the 
raw material, had it pleased him to do so. But so it did not 
please him. On the contrary, he has executed his purposes on 
this earth in past ages, for the most part by human agency ; 
and thus he will execute his purposes in ages to come. Hence 
the agents proposed to be employed in the next opening scene in 
earth’s eventful history are now in training; among which mani- 
festly is the young American Republic. 


| 


66 


By the sundering of the ties that bound this to the parent 
country, and the subsequent dissolution of the union between 
Church and State among ourselves, we have been preserved 
from many of the vices to which the exercise of despotic power 

mevitably tends. 
The establishment of free institutions, the intellectual and 
moral training of the masses under them, and the activity, and 
enterprise, and energy thus called forth, have all tended to 
qualify the people of the United States, not only for perfecting 
the reforms commenced in the New World, but also for acting 
a distinguished part in the renovation of the OLD. 

By making a lodgment on the shores of the Pacific we have 
acquired the position, by the discovery of exhaustless mineral 
wealth we shall soon have accumulated the capital, and by a 
further and more skilful application of the elements of nature to 
the arts, we shall have secured the leisure requisite to the exe- 
cution of the high office assigned us in the providence of God— 
the office of co-operating with him m extending Freedom and 
Christianity, not only to the shores of the Pacific, but to the 
nations that lie beyond that boundary. 

Previous to the substitution of elemental for muscular power, 
man ate his bread in the sweat of his brow, and only in the 
sweat of his brow. Hence the masses had but little respite from 
labor, and the accumulation of capital, which is the product of 
labor, was tedious and slow. Since that substitution, it has been 
eminently otherwise. | 

Great as was the former glory of Greece and Rome, that of 
Britain — little isolated Britain —is this hour still greater. Why 
this vast and disproportionate pre-eminence? Why? Because 
to Greece and Rome the science of chemistry, the art of print- 
img, and the application of steam, of electricity, of magnetism, 
and of sunbeams to the production of useful effects, were un- 
known. Neither Greece nor Rome, when at the zenith of their 


OF 


glory, had either steamboats, or railroads, or telegraphs, or 
daguerreotypes. Britain has them all. It is neither her armies 
or her navies, but her steam engines, her machinery, and her 
coal fields that make Britain what she is. She has less terri- 
tory and fewer operatives than many of her European neighbors, 
but more machinery than any, if not all of them. The United 
States, ere having reached the vigor of manhood, has become 
the compeer of Britain in the use of machinery, and a partaker 
in her glory. It is not physical strength exerted in labor, but 
mind—free, educated mind—controlling and directing the ele- 
ments of nature in their mighty movements and varied applica- 
tions, that is hereafter to provide for the wants of the world. 

And since so wonderful has been the increase of production 
by the humble experiments already made— often ignorantly 
made—what may not be expected from the more enligthened 
experiments hereafter to be made ¢ 

What may not be expected m the factory, when an improved 
philosophy shall have made known to the manufacturer the laws 
of those mighty elements with which he is surrounded ? When 
an enlightened experience shall have tested their respective 
powers, and ascertained the most effective methods of their seve- 
ral applications ? 

What may not be expected in the field, when a perfected 
chemistry shall have revealed to the husbandman the constitu- 
ents of the different soils, and the different manures which exist 
in nature, and the different vegetable productions to which they 
are severally adapted ? 

What may not be expected with respect to the changed con- 
dition of man, when, to provide for his entire physical wants, it 
shall only be necessary to supervise and direct the movements 
of the elements in the performance of the respective offices 
assigned them’? and when, by such supervision merely, produc- 
tion shall be increased a hundred or a thousand fold ? 


68 


When this shall come to pass—and come to pass it will— 
how much time will be redeemed from the claims of the factory 
and the field for improving among the masses, even, the intellec- 
tual and moral powers, for cultivating the social affections, for 
performing deeds of charity, for the enjoyment of the sublime 
and beautiful, and for perfecting the soul in holiness by the con- 
templation of the beatitudes of heaven, and the worship of that 
adorable Being who reigns there. 

The wants of man’s physical nature thus provided for, it will 
only remain to distribute the Bible, and carry into practical 
effect that love of God and man which it inculcates, to make 
earth what heaven is—a realm of peace and of enjoyment. 
And it is his purpose that sueh earth shall be. Under his provi- 
dence, the material is always subordinate to the spiritual; and 
to facilitate the introduction of earth’s coming jubilee, is the 
great end, the final cause, of that increase of production, and 
exemption from labor, of which we have been speaking. 

Christianity, though first proclaimed in Palestine, and to mere 
shepherds, feeding their flocks by night, was intended for univer- 
sal application. Hence, the movement of the Star of Bethlehem, 
which guided the eastern Magi to the manger of the infant Savior, 
has, like that of the orb of day, its symbol, hitherto been west- 
ward; and it will continue to be so, till, having made the circuit 
of the earth, and blessed in its course the nations that dwell 
thereon, it reaches and rests again over that manger, to which, 
at first, it conducted the wise men. 

And though, in furtherance of this ultimate design, we have 
been instrumental, in planting the banner of the cross on the 
shores of the Pacific, still, beyond that stand-point there is visible 
to the eye of faith vast regions, yet unblessed, or only partially 
blessed. There is visible, the Polynesian and other islands of 
the sea; the mighty Chinese empire; the millions that mhabit 
the slopes of the Himmalayah mountains ; and the many more 


69 


millions still, which people the regions through which the Ganges 
and the Indus send forward their waters to the ocean. 

Nor will our destiny be accomplished, till all these millions,— 
nay, till all earth’s mightier millions are redeemed, and the 
whole world is full of the knowledge and glory of God. 

Having been permitted on this jubilee to share the pleasures 
of reviewing the glorious triumphs of the past, and being sum- 
moned in the providence of God to take part in hastening for- 
ward the still more glorious triumphs of the future, who of you 
will not respond to the summons, and, buckling on his armor, 
form, ere you separate, the high resolves to go hence to do battle 
for your country, your race, and your God ? 

Go, then, — go, explain the laws of life in the nursery, and 
administer remedies to the sufferer in the sick room. Go, re- 
form the moralities of the bar, defend the defenceless, vindicate 
the right, and strip from guilt its assumed covering. Go, ex- 
pound the law in righteousness, and sustain the majesty of gov- 
ernment on the bench. Go, and regardless of commendation or 
of censure, and scorning the traitor’s bribe, seek your country’s 
good, and only your country’s good in the Senate chamber. 
Go, charm down the spirit of party, and heal the divisions in 
Christ’s rent church. Go, kindle a holier zeal, and cherish a 
more fraternal spirit among her divided ministry. 

Next to religion, and as auxiliary to it, favor the cause of 
science. That is a mistaken view of duty which frowns on the 
study of nature lest its teachings should contradict the teachings 
of revelation. ‘Truth is no less truth, when revealed in sunbeams 
from the firmament above, or exhumed from darkness amid the 
folds of the fossiliferous rocks below, than when inscribed on 
earth’s surface, by the pen of the historian on scrolls of parch- 
ment, or transferred to the marble by the chisel of the sculptor. 
Wherever God teaches, it cannot be profane for man to learn. 


T0 


No matter how far around, the telescope extends the astrono- 

mer’s field of vision, the field of God’s omnipresence extends to 
infinitude beyond it. No matter how far back the geologist 
may trace this world’s unwritten history, back of that epoch 
there still remains untraced the unwritten history of God’s past 
eternity. No matter how minute the atoms, or contracted the 
compartments, the microscope, in its descent towards nothing, 
reveals, it will reveal no atoms too minute for God to see, or 
compartments too narrow for God to work in. 
No matter in what direction or to what extent, inquiries after 
truth are prosecuted, from each the answer returned will be the 
same. From the strata embedded in the depths of the earth ; 
from the blossoming flowers on its surface, as well as from the 
suns that burn and stars that glitter in the firmament above it, 
a voice, every where alike, 1s heard to say, ‘‘ God ig here, and 
here, and here.’ Worlds which God made and governs are 
surely fit text books for man to study. So thought Joz, and 
Davin, and Isatau, and HABAKKUK. 

It was the fool that said, ‘‘ There is no God.” It ig still the 
fool that repeats that saying. Neither astronomy nor geology 
can exist without God. It 1s as absurd to base our rocks as our 
hopes on nothing. 

Go, then, and with the Bible in your hand, and the love of 
God in your hearts, study nature everywhere — deeply, fearlessly. 
And thus studying it, you will find that the teachings of Greece 
are the same as of Palestine —of Athens as of Jerusalem. You 
will find that the same pencil, that painted the rose of Sharon, 
and the lily of the valley, paints also those flowers that blossom 
in the vale of Tempe; and that Ida and Olympus, no less than 
Carmel and Tabor, testify of God. 

Go, then, plant the banner of Religion in the vestibule of 
Science, nor feel that the student’s work is done till her temple, 
already sacred to ‘Truth, shall become sacred also to Religion. 


71 
. 

Above all, attend to your personal salvation; that having 
signalized the age in which you lived by deeds of greatness, and 
qualified yourselves for more exalted society by the performance 
of deeds of goodness on the earth, you may be accounted worthy 
to be associated with angels, and the spirits of just men made 
perfect in heaven; so that, should there be, hereafter, semi- 
centennial gatherings, such as once there has already been, the 
Alumni then assembled may, pointing to your example, encourage 
to noble deeds the Alumni who shall live after them, as we now 
encourage to noble deeds those who shall live after us, by poimt- 
ing to the example of those Alumni, sainted spirits who have 
gone to heaven before us, and who now beckon us from thence, 
saying, “Companions of our pilgrimage, whom we have left 
behind, be faithful to the trusts committed to your keeping, and 
persevering to the end, come up hither.”’ 

And such future gatherings there doubtless will be. But 
who of us, who of you, will be present even at the first of them ? 
Ah, who ? 

When XERXES cast his eye over the millions he had assem- 
bled on the banks of the Hellespont, he wept—wept at the 
thought that at the expiration of a century, not one of all that 
mighty multitude would be alive. And well XERXES might 
weep. ‘Tears befitted that occasion: but tears befit not this. 

To XERXES, death was the extinction of life itself. ‘To us, it 
is the transition merely from a lower to a higher life. He had 
visited the tomb of ADAM only—a tomb after the lapse of so 
many ages still dark and silent. We have visited the tomb of 
JESUS 
triumph. 

He had been taught by the providence of God, that this dust 
must return to the earth as it was, and only that it must so 


a tomb radiant with light and vocal with the song of 


return. We, by his Gospel, that ‘when this dust returns to 
the earth as it was, the spirit ascends to God who gave it.” 


12 

He was aware of that announcement from the judgment seat 
of God, ** Dust thou art, sinner, and to dust shalt thou return.” 
But he was not aware of that subsequent announcement from 
his mercy seat, “‘ Behold the hour is coming in which all they 
that are in their graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God, 
and shall come forth.”’ 

He, wildering amid the darkness, and impelled by the selfish- 
ness of nature was sure of a present life only, and only solicitous 
therefore about a present and personal enjoyment. We, guided 
by the light and imbued with the spirit of the Gospel, become 
heirs to a glorious future, and partakers in a double blessedness 
by partaking in the blessedness of others. 

What matters it to us that the individual dies, since the race 
continues? We are not isolated beings, but integral parts of 
that continuous stream of life m which generation presses genera- 
tion onward to eternity, as in some mighty river, particle presses 
particle towards the ocean. | 

Though we should not be present, at even the first future 
semi-centennial gathering, our children, and our children’s chil- 
dren, will be. Or should they not, other human beings will, 
and beings as susceptible of joy, and as high in hope as we. 
The bar, the bench, the senate, will each be represented. The 
man of business will be there; there too will be the man of 
science, aye, and the man of mercy. 

The same tribute will then, as now, be paid to the dead, and 
the same anticipations will be cherished by the living. | 

Then, as now, the blossommg flowers in yonder garden will 
invite, by their beauty and their fragrance, the returned Alumni 
to revisit those loved walks, which, elate with hope or saddened 
by disappointment, they so often visited during their collegiate 
course. Then, as now, yon classic groves will proffer to those 
semi-centennial visitors their noon-day shadow; and then, as 
now, at early dawn, the birds will sing among their branches. 


13 


Then, as now, the heavens will smile propitious on that gather- 
ing, and God, the common Father, will signalize their meeting as 
he now does ours, by his all-pervading presence. 

After the vicissitudes of a life so long, it 1s a happiness, be- 
loved pupils, to have been permitted to meet once more together, 
to enquire of each other’s welfare, and exchange our. joyous 
salutations. And it is sad, having done so, to think that we 
must separate so soon, and separate never to meet on earth 
again. But how much sadder would it be to separate, if this 
were the students’ last meeting, and the race were to become 
extinct, and earth deserted with the extinction of the life of the 
last of the Alumni here assembled ? 

At such a moment, and when the adieus which friends here 
are about to take of friends remind us of the adieus the dead 
have already taken, and which the living soon must take: at 
such a moment it is cheering to reflect that there will be a sun 
to shine, and stars to glitter, and seas to roar, and harvest fields 
to produce, and a God to reign, to be adored, and worshippers 
to adore him, after our brief part is acted, and we shall have 
gone to our rest. 

Standing as we now do, in the midst of the assembled Alumni 
of an Institution, with the supervision of which we have, in the 
mysterious providence of God, been so long charged, soon to 
resign that charge, we turn in its behalf, in behalf of the friends 
we leave behind, of the country, still dear to us, and of the 
world where we received our being and in which will repose our 
ashes, to you, beloved pupils, whom we once taught, and coun- 
selled, and prayed for, and whom we still love with a parent’s 
love, and confide in with a parent’s confidence ; yes, to you we 
turn, and to you commit the interests of each—of all. You will 
live after us, and live, we doubt not, to advocate your Alma 
Mater’s cause, sustain her reputation, and perpetuate her system 
of kindly wakeful parental discipline ; live to assert your coun- 


K 


T4 


try’s rights, and defend her liberties, not by the sword, indeed, 
but by giving tone and direction to that public opinion that is 
more mighty than the sword. : 

It is impossible, in the prospect of death, to look over such an 
assemblage of young, educated and enterprizing men, filling the 
different professions, and trained up in the enjoyment of liberty, 
and under the teachings of the Bible, without feeling that, under 
God, for the future there is hope. You can, and you will, we 
trust, cause to be sent abroad from this college, as from some 
great central source of power, an influence that shall extend 
itself to other, and yet other, and yet other minds, till it shall 
reach the extremities of the State, the country, and the world, 
and perpetuate itself through other, and yet othér, and yet other 
generations, till the last generation ever to occupy earth’s thea- 
tre shall have taken their stand upon it. 

Though it were certain, therefore, that no one now alive, 
would be alive and present at any future collegiate gathering, 
still those gatherings would be in prospect not the less objects of 
deep and solemn interest on that account. 

At the first of them, however, some present here to-day, will, 
it is presumed, be present there. But who? How few in num- 
ber, and those how changed! With gray hairs, and tottering 
step, and faltering voice, methinks I see appearing in the midst 
of that young, ardent, joyous future assembly, here and there a 
solitary mdividual, as the speaker, who has outlived his age, 
appears in this. Regarded indeed with interest—a melancholy 
interest — because rums are always so regarded, and only so 
regarded. 

But as to the rest of us—-of you— here present, where will 
they be ? Where? Where the dead now are, and forgotten by 
the living, as the dead are now forgotten. 

Who now thinks of Smiru or Maxcy? Who now visits the 
tomb of Epwarps ? And how few, even remember that his mon- 


75 


ument has a place among the grave stones beside the pathway 
to the house in which we have assembled. 

But though the dead should on that future gathering be for- 
gotten by the living, the living will be remembered by the dead. 
The dead, though dead, may be present at that gathering in 
spirit, though not in body, seeing though unseen, —sent back 
to earth on some errand of mercy, or the commissioned guardian 
angels of loved ones left behind. 

Or, though not present, tidings from that gathering may still 
reach us in the spirit world. Angels visit the abodes, and take 
an interest in the affairs of men. Words of wisdom spoken, and 
deeds of goodness performed on earth, are reported in the 
heavens. There is joy there over a sinner that repenteth. 


“*Tis not the whole of life to live, 
Nor all of death to die.” 


Beyond this vale of tears there are higher duties to perform, 
renewed friendships to enioy, and brighter glories to behold. 

True, God’s image has been effaced from human hearts, and 
life eternal forfeited. True, the King of Terrors is yet in power 
here. ‘The earth, man’s birth-place, is his burying-place, where 
during six thousand years, generation following generation has 
just trod upon its surface, and then been interred beneath it. 
There, imprisoned, rests the dust of friends and kindred; there 
rests the dust of patriarchs, and prophets, and martyrs, and 
righteous men. ‘There for ages that dust has rested, and not 
without reason still rests in hope, for the veracity of God’s 
Eternal Son is pledged that from that dust the reproach of 
death shall be wiped away. Nor will his mediatorial work be 
finished, till he redeems that pledge. 

‘“‘T shall be satisfied,” said David, the sleep of death being 
ended, ‘when I awake in thy likeness.” 

An earnest of that awakening has been already given—given 
when at the rich Arimathean’s rock-excavated tomb, the angel 


16 


of God descended,—when the stone was rolled back, and the 
guard, placed in vain at its entrance to protect the avenues from 
death to life, fled terrified, while the earth shook beneath them, 
and the grave through all its quaking caverns owned, that not 
the conquered, but the Conqueror, was leaving death’s dominions. 

That triumph was the earnest of another and more glorious 
triumph, when the everlasting doors which, once opened to 
receive from the top of Olivet man’s great deliverer, shall again 
open to give ghim egress on that august occasion, when in the 
presence of the assembled universe, the last crowning act of 
man’s redemption is to be performed. 

Though created in God’s own image, and created for immor- 
tality, as yet we have seen but little of those works and wonders, 
which during the past eternity, God has wrought. We were not 
even present at the opening act of earth’s eventful drama, but 
we shall be present at its concluding scene. 

We shall see the sign of the Son of Man coming in the clouds 
of heaven. We shall hear the archangel’s trump; we shall see 
the graves open, the dead arise, and the judgment set. We 
shall hear the final sentence, and witness the final separation ; 
hear the wail of lost spirits, and the song of triumph that will 
break from redeemed lips. 

Nor as mere spectators, shall we witness the awful grandeurs 
of that last great day. Among the risen dead, we shall have a 
place assigned us. The teacher and the taught will be alike 
arraigned, and alike required to render an account of all the 
deeds now done in the body. Sinners, as we are, how can we 
render that account? How can we answer for buried talents ? 
for neglected opportunities? for rejected overtures of mercy ? 
What shall we—what can we—before that dread tribunal say ? 
We can say then what we now say, ‘‘ Though we are unworthy, 
‘‘worthy is the Lamb that loved us, gave himself to die for us, 
and hath redeemed us by his blood.” 


TH 


Clothed with such a righteousnes, imputed though it be, it is 
not presumptuous to cherish the hope of forgiven sin, or even 
arrogant to aspire to the companionship of angels. No matter 
how tall they are, or how lofty, or firm their standing,—clothed 
with a Saviour’s righteousness, we can stand beside them; with 
confidence we can stand beside them, sinless though they be ; 
and though we, alas! are sinners, they will not feel dishonored 
by our presence, for God is not dishonored by it. And God is 
not dishonored because redeemed sinners have a right to stand 
before him. That right was purchased, dearly purchased,—was 
bought with blood, and blood no less than that of the Supreme. 

Having in prospect a future so full of glory, who would live 
here always. ‘True, friends, and country, and sacred home are 
here. Here, too, are fields of beauty and notes of melody, and 
throughout the entire of nature, God’s all-pervading goodness is 
apparent. It were unnatural not to love this fair world, and 
ungrateful in the midst of so many mercies, not to say as the 
disciples said at Christ’s transfiguration, “it is good for us to 
be here.”’ 

Still heaven is the better country; there purer light shines, 
there brighter glories are displayed, there God our Saviour 
reigns. 

It is sad, indeed, to die; sad to bid adieu to these objects of 
our regard ; to the walks we have traced, the gardens we have 
laid out, the groves we have planted, the friends we love, and 
the world that gave us birth. 

But after all, death causes but a momentary separation. 
You, beloved pupils, will remain behind, after we are gone, to 
visit those groves, and gardens, we have so often visited, to 
behold that sunshine we have so long beheld, and to enjoy the 
society of those friends it has hitherto been our privilege to 
enjoy. But having done so for a few short years, you in your 
turn, will bequeath the whole to those who shall live after you, 


78 


and then we shall meet again. And since we shall meet again, 
though some natural tears we shed at parting, let them be tears 
of joy. Why from such a jubilee should we go sorrowing away ? 
Redemption is finished, the proffer of forgiveness universal. 
And though the dead cannot profit by that proffer, the living 
may. See you that the living do. 

Having been permitted to meet as children, and children’s 
children, after a long absence, meet at the paternal home, to 
exchange the fraternal salutation, to receive the paternal bene- 
diction, and to present before God’s mercy-seat grateful ac- 
knowledgments for the mercies of the past, and implore his 
blessing for the future, let us return rejoicing to resume life’s 
cares, to endure life’s sorrows, to perform life’s duties; and 
graving still deeper the impression we wish to leave on this 
world’s tablet, let us strive the more earnestly to secure the 
enrollment of our names in the Lamb’s Book of Life. And fore- 
warned as we are, by the death-starred names on the catalogue 
of those thinned classes represented here to-day, that time is 
short and death certain, let us hereafter cancel the current 
claims of life as they present themselves, meet the daily and the 
hourly duties as they rise, and strike with every setting sun the 
balance of this world’s account ; that come that dread destroyer 
when he may, and however unexpectedly, he may find us ready 
and waiting for the summons. 

In the meantime, and since for repentant sinners there is hope 


beyond the grave, let us who possess this hope — (and why, since - 


grace is free, should we not all possess it?) — console ourselves 
and comfort one another with these cheering words, ‘ We shall 
meet again.” And Christians, we shall, thanks to redeeming 
love, we shall meet agam — meet around the Redeemer’s throne, 
to receive his welcome, to behold his glory, to speak his praises, 
and lay the willing honors of our creation and redemption at his 


Tall old 


a foot. Till then, farewell —a last, a long, but not a sad, fare- 
well. | 


“ And now unto Him who is able to keep you from falling, and 
na 


to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with 
exceeding joy; to God only wise, our Savior, be glory and ma- 
jesty, dominion and power, both now and forever.” AMEN. 


’ 


7 


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et gaits: a fetal dpe wnlarditnds | 
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e. GS. SN. ROR 8 pid Rh. {out tage 


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=o» +9 age he Os. : t : os r oe tee ‘ dd rene } Ay My 


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iy yee eR NB has. tes ‘nee De vse 
'¥ Fs : t © . me a si a eae ae ee * ‘th 


stp ee he moet ‘tbs ~a aye we 9 ang ‘he: ten. ae 
a ut inh ort aoe! 5 ee 


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7 ‘ 


PROCEEDINGS, Se. 


Dr. Nort, having concluded his address and left the church, a meeting 
of the Alumni was organized. On motion of Judge Campsuty, Grorax 
Urrotp, D. D., Bishop of Indiana, of the Class of 1814, the senior 
graduate present, was called to the chair, and Amos Dran, LL. D., 
of Albany, of the class of 1826, was appointed Secretary. 

Bishop Uproxp, on taking the chair, stated that the honor was 
unexpected, and found him unprepared to address the meeting at 
length. It was forty years since he had participated in any exercises 
of his Alma Mater; but he could perceive scarcely any change in the 
wisdom and eloquence and power of Dr. Norr. He then expressed 
his hearty sympathy with the feelings and object of the meeting, and 
called upon Hon. Amasa J. Parker, of the class of 1825. 


Judge Parker said he rose for the purpose of offering a reso- 
lution, and if he was so unparliamentary as to preface it with a 
few remarks before reading it, it was not from any apprehension 
that it needed argument in its support, for he could not doubt 
but it would receive the cordial concurrence of every alwinnus 
present. 

The Alumni, (he continued,) were assembled under extra- 
ordinary and deeply interesting circumstances. When before, 
and where else, in the world’s history, has it happened that an 
iudividual had continued to preside over such an institution for 
a full half century, guiding it by his genius, attracting towards 


R4 


it by his high personal character, imparting to it from his stores 
of wisdom and learning, and securing to it abundant means of 
usefulness and a reputation constantly increasing to the last. 
The occurrence of such an'event was a fit occasion for our Alma 
Mater to call her children around her, and they gladly avail 
themselves of the opportunity to kneel again at her feet, to crave 
her blessing, and to pour forth an earnest prayer for the contin« 
uance of her prosperity and usefulness. Our paths have been 
various and divergent. Scattered over this great continent, and 
busily engaged in the earnest pursuits of life, our often-expressed 
intention of attending “the next commencement’? has been 
rarely realized. ‘Though college reminiscences have sometimes 
stolen in upon our memories, to charm us with the recollections of 
earlier and more disinterested days, yet so absorbing have been 
the more selfish pursuits of maturer life, that it needed some 
striking event like that we are assembled to commemorate, to 
start us on our pilgrimage. 

I am sure there is not a graduate present, of the great num- 
ber here assembled, who does not feel most deeply sensible of 
his obligations to the venerable president, and who does not 
love and revere him with filial affection. There is not one, I am 
equally sure, who has not felt deeply concerned for the result of 
the recent investigation of the financial affairs of the college, and 
who does not rejoice at a result which so completely vindicates 
its president from the charges made against him. ‘The investi- 
gation has shown how devoted have been the energies, how dis- 
interested the labors of our venerable friend, and has developed 
his long-since conceived but recently matured plan of endowing 
his favorite institution with his own private fortune, for the pur- 
pose of placing it upon a foundation so broad, as to means and 
efficiency, as to secure it against future contingency. It needed 
along and patient examination into the almost forgotten trans- 
actions of a previous generation — to collect the proofs widely 


85 


scattered and half-buried in the rubbish and neglect of honest 
confidence — to seek out the aged men still providentially spared, 
to testify of facts unknown to the present generation, for the 
purpose of vindicating him before the world. Confident in his 
integrity, he needed nothing more for his defence. 

“ Integer vite scelerisque purus 

Non eget Mauris jaculis, neque arcu, 

Nec venenatis gravida sagittis, 

Fusce, pharetra.” 

We rejoice to see so great and good a man sustained. The 
blows of his assailants have fallen harmless at his feet. We hail 
with joy the triumphant resvlt. 

A long life devoted to the improvement of his race, rich in 
the beneficent use of the choicest personal gifts, marked by the 
most exemplary practice of virtue, commands the respect and 
admiration of the world. We cordially unite in congratulations 
for the past and hope for the future, and we trust that he may 
long be spared to labor in his field of usefulness. We may be 
permitted, I think, to borrow from a Roman poet the expression 
of a wish more appropriate to our venerable preceptor than to 
the Roman emperor, —‘“ Serus in coelum redeat.”’ 


Judge Parxer then submitted the following resolution : 


Resolved, by the Alumni here assembled, That we tender to Dr. 
Norr our most respectful and heartfelt congratulations on this epoch 
in his life. We congratulate him on the unprecedented period of half 
a century during which he has presided over this college, and in which, 
under his wise administration, it has grown from the acorn of 1804, to 
the wide-spreading oak of 1854; we congratulate him on the manifold 
contributions to literature, science and religion, which Union College 
has sent forth during these fifty years; we congratulate him on his 
triumph over the recent attacks upon him, for, though, from the very 
first, we were well assured of the result, yet we could not know the 
unparalleled munificence which it was to reveal; and, lastly, we con- 
gratulate him on the affection and admiration which he so wonderfully 
inspires in all those who have ever sat at his feet, and of which our 
presence here is a proof ; and we hope to return for many succeeding 
years to renew these our congratulations. ‘‘ Serus in ccelum redeat.”’ 


86 


The resolution was seconded by Rev. W. W. Puruttips, D. D., of 
New-York, of the class of 1815, with some appropriate and effective 
remarks. It was passed unanimously and enthusiastically. 

The chairman then called upon Rey. Duncan Kennepy, D. D., of 
Albany, of the class of 1855, who spoke as follows : 


If true greatness consists in doing the greatest good to the 
greatest number, for the greatest length of time, then the name 
of Dr. Nort deserves a high place among the great men of the 
age. 

Mr. Presipent—'The occasion which convenes us at this 
hour, 18 one of no common interest, and in one respect of no 
common occurrence. We meet here in obedience to a two-fold 
call. The voice of our Alma Mater invites us to her annual fes- 
tival, to partake of the social and intellectual repast which she 
is always careful to provide for her welcome guests, and to wit- 
ness the imposing ceremony with which she sends forth a fresh 
group of her children whom she has been assiduously preparing 
for the great theatre of future action. It is fit we should be 
present at such a time as this. It is grateful to the feelings of 
the sons of such a mother, to make an annual pilgrimage to the 
old homestead, turning aside from the dust and turmoil of the 
various spheres in which we are trying to act well our part in 
the great drama of life. We meet here an influence calculated 
to soothe our minds, allay the asperities that so frequently chafe 
our spirits; and in these quiet retreats we gather new strength 
to meet the stern conflicts we may yet be called to encounter. 
In the experience of many of us, the gay visions of youth have 
given place to the grave realities of sober manhood; in the 
experience of some, their brightness has been supplanted by the 
sombre hues of age. And yet, at this hour, it seems but as 
yesterday since we left these joyous scenes, and overlooking, by 
a happy illusion, the interval of years, we are all young again. 


87 


We bless the occasion! May it abound in influences salutary 
and enduring to every devoted son of Union! 

But, Mr. President, we meet at the present hour, in cheerful 
obedience to a still higher call, and in delighted recognition 
of a more stirrmg claim. Commencements are comparatively 
ordinary occurrences, always interesting, it is true, and always 
deserving our attention. But the event that now especially ani- 
mates us, is one that concentrates in itself the interest of many 
commencements; which bears relation to scenes and occurrences 
of many years; and which has been gathering importance, 
impressiveness and grandeur, during the revolutions of half a 
century. It is an event that comes to us from the past, with 
the steady progress which marks the gradual advance of some 
massive architectural structure towards its full completion. The 
years of toil have at length ended; the sons of labor have 
finished their work; the last scaffolding has been removed; the 
last finishing touch has been given; and the noble edifice stands 
before us, firm in its foundations, symmetrical in its proportions, 
and beautiful in all its parts. Such is the event we are now 
met to contemplate and celebrate. The occasion is hallowed by 
many impressive facts and associations. For fifty years has the 
venerated President of Union College been laboring in the wide 
field of usefulness to which Divine Providence called him in the 
vigor of young manhood. And thankful to that Providence for 
sparing him thus long and girding him with strength equal to his 
day, we tender to him at this hour our heartfelt congratulations. 
We come to pledge him anew, upon the altar of filial piety, our 
respect, our confidence, and our love. 

Probably not a similar event has heretofore occurred in the 
history of any other institution in our country. It must, at any 
rate, be very rare, if it be not indeed without a parallel, to find 
a man who has been for fifty consecutive years at the head of a 
single institution of learning; and perhaps rarer still, to find one 


8& 


whom passing time has touched less roughly, and upon whom 
are found fewer traces of weakness and decay. He 1s still com- 
paratively vigorous and active. Like the mighty oak of the 
forest, he has encountered and weathered many a storm, and 
still survives to enjoy a green old age. With some good mea- 
sure of truthfulness we may say of him, “‘his eye is not dim, 
neither is his natural force abated.” 

But, Mr. President, in indulging the emotions so natural to 
the occasion, I fear I have gone somewhat aside of the sentiment 
which I have submitted. ‘True greatness:—What is it? Does 
it not consist in doing the greatest good to the greatest number, 
for the greatest length of time? If not, in what else does it 
consist ? What other definition or description can be given of 
it, if this be incorrect? It consists in doing goed ;—not in great 
acts only, not in mighty achievements merely, for these may be 
injurious in proportion to their magnitude, and surely true great- 
ness can hold no fellowship with evil in any measure or form. 
A man who does no good to his fellow-men, who seeks to confer 
no benefit upon his kind, who is willing to prostitute his energies 
to acts of oppression and wickedness; or who is even satisfied 
with a life of indolent inactivity,—content to live a blank in the 
world, and to leave it without exciting the regret of any,—surely 
such a man cannot be called truly great! He may be great m 
wealth which he has inherited from others; he may be great 
in age, because no toil has ever made inroads upon his animal 
nature ; he may be great in physical proportions as the ox or 
the elephant is great, but in no proper respect can he be called 
a truly great man. As to his mental and moral proportions he 
is the merest dwarf; and as to his mfluence for good he is the 
veriest pigmy. ‘I'o be truly great, the intellect not only, but 
the heart also, must be trained to noble exertions. Purity of 
purpose and energy of mind must co-exist and co-operate. The 
influence a man may exert may be powerful; he may be a man 


* 


iv 5) 


8 


of towering aspirations, of far-reaching purposes, and of splendid 
executive abilities; but if the power he wields be not directed 
to worthy ends,—if it be not consecrated to the work of “raising 
men to heaven,”’ instead of “dragging angels down,” he cannot 
be called a truly great man. He may be called a great scourge, 
a great curse; he may be great as Lucifer is great, but a truly 
great man he cannot be. He only is great whose soul bears 
something of the impress of heaven, and who labors to diffuse 
around him, to the utmost limit he is capable of reaching, the 
power of an improving and elevating influence. 

To such a man no sphere of action is so attractive or promis- 
ing as that which embraces the intellectual and moral character 
of men. He does the greatest good to the greatest number who 
thus seeks to control the inward springs of action in the human 
soul, and strives thus to establish the supremacy of the spiritual 
over the material, and compel the outward and visible to do 
homage to the inward and invisible. Such a man, standing at 
the head of an institution of learning, laboring to achieve the 
high object of his exalted mission, is enabled to accomplish an 
amount of good which it is impossible fully to estimate. He is 
constantly exciting and giving direction to the latent energies 
of the minds subjected to his training,—2 imparting his own im- 
pulses to noble efforts, and sending them forth, ‘in the spirit 
and power’ of his own nature, to become his representatives 
and agents in blessing the community. And however widely 
they may be scattered over the land, however diversified their 
pursuits, his spirit is in them all, and he speaks in them and by 
them to all with whom they come in contact. And, I ask, what 
influence can be so extended as this? This is emphatically doing 
good to the greatest number. Itis universal benefit that is thus 
conferred, limited to no one class or condition, but extendmg to 
all. Its salutary power is felt, not only by the statesman, the 
professional man, the philosopher, but reaches to all conditions 

M 


7 9p 
and occupations in life. It teaches the farmer to increase the 
products of the soil; the artizan to perfect the practical details 
of mechanical philosophy; and the merchant to conduct with 
greater success, and with higher benefit to the world, the ex- 
changes of domestic and foreign commerce. Like the sun, it 
illumines all; like the dew, it fertilizes all. 

But the good thus achieved, is marked, not only by the eztent, 
but also by the perpetuity of its mfluence. It is good done for 
the greatest length of tume. What is more enduring in its 
nature, than the improvement of mind? What is so unchanging ° 
in its character and results, as the education of our spiritual 
nature? Indeed this is the only acquisition made on earth that 
man does not leave behind him when his body sinks into the 
grave. Gold and silver are perishable. Fame is insubstan- 
tial as the breath that creates it; glory, as fading as the garland 
that for an hour decks the brow of its votary. But education is 
an acquirement which becomes blended with the very essence of 
the soul, and becomes identified with its deathless being. The 
mind that is really improved, is improved for eternity. The 
noble adornments it receives here, in the development of its 
powers and the enlargement of its capacities, are to go with it 
as a part of itself, when it enters upon its future and interm- 
inable state of bemg. ‘The light of education, like the sacred 
lamp in the Jewish temple, is to shine with perpetual lustre; 
and when the outward material fabric which here for a time. 
enshrines it, crumbles into ruins, it is to be transferred to an- 
other state, and increase its radiance amid the splendors of a 
brighter dispensation. Here, then, we have the essential elements 
of true greatness,—doing the greatest good to the greatest 
number, and for the greatest length of time. 

I feel, Mr. President, that these elements of greatness find 
an actual and a remarkable embodiment and illustration in the 
character and history of him, the tenth lustrum of whose presi- 


91 


dency of Union College we now celebrate. I claim perfection 
for no human character. Absolute greatness has been exhibited 
but once on earth,=—in the person of the Incarnate Deity. But 
it is pleasant to contemplate in human attamment any marked 
approximation to this high standard, as it is always a grateful 
duty to honor the man who gives to the world the moral influ- 
ence of such an example. 

Dr. Nott, having in an eminent degree possessed and exem- 
plified the elements essential to true greatness, deserves and 
receives, with cordial concession, a distinguished place among 
the great men of the age. And who is so bold as to challenge 
the justice of the award! For fifty years has he been assidu- 
ously devoted to the improvement of mind—in giving vigor and 
direction to mental energy, and sending forth into the various 
departments of society throngs of educated men who became the 
master spirits of their day. For fifty years has he toiled to 
create a conservative and elevating influence, increasing in power 
and extent with every annual revolution, till now his representa- 
tives are found engaged in every department of knowledge and 
industry, and on every quarter of the globe. I believe, sir, 
there are to be found this day, in EKurope, in Asia and in Africa, 
hearts that beat as warmly and truly in admiration of the cha- 
racter and influence of Dr. Nort, as are found in America, in 
our own country, in our own state. ‘There are numbered among 
his “children,” those presiding in halls of justice, occupying 
high stations in the national and state legislatures, in the sacred 
profession laboring with distinguished honor and usefulness at 
home, or toiling for the improvement of the race ‘far hence 
among the Gentiles.” In the legal and medical professions, in 
the army and navy, in every department of art and science, are 
found those who have received benefit from his plastic influence. 
And, sir, I am proud to say, that I believe not one among the 
multitude that have gone forth from under his tuition, has ever 


® 


borne the character of ihgrate, smiting the parent whose gifts 
he had failed to appreciate. Sir, I have yet to meet that grad- 
uate of Union College who las ceased to love and venerate his 
former teacher—whose bosom does not swell with a manly pride, 
whose eye does not light up with a clearer brilliancy, and whose 
voice does not take a firmer tone, as he mentions the name of 
Dr. Nort. 

In a world like this, it would be strange; indeed, if such a 
character as Dr. Nort’s should not excite the jealousy and envy 
of inferior minds. And, certainly, he is not exposed to the woe 
of having “all men speak well of him.” He has had his trials. 
He has had to encounter combined and ddroitly arranged 
attacks, before which hearts less strongly fortified in conscious 
integrity might well have quailed. But, sir, he has never proved 
the craven. His spirit has risen superior to every assault, and 
he has thrown off the depressing influence of his trials as the 
lion shakes the dew from his mane. His foes have been openly 
met, and been vanquished in every encounter. And more than 
one scarred and erippled assailant can bear testimony that Dr. 
Nort has always been found ready in the 


field of battle, 
In the bivouac of life, 

Nor like dumb and driven cattle; 
But a hero in the strife.” 


But I fear, Mr. President, that I am taking up more time 
than properly belongs to me: I will add but a word more. ‘To. 
my mind there is much that is sublimely impressive in this 
assemblage. We feel, as the Alumni of this Institution, that the 
object before us is worthy,—that it is no apocryphal character 
we are contemplating, but a true, living reality. We come here 
as children return to the home of their youth,—we come to do 
homage to a venerable parent,—we come to “bow before the 
face of the old man,” to receive his benediction, and to “rise 
up and call him blessed.” We come to revive our impressions 


93 


of his worth, and to renew our recollections of benefits bestowed 
upon us. Not only from the chair of philosophy, but from the 
sacred desk have we received his instructions. And few, if 
any, there are, of our number, who have tiot been thrilled by 
his manly eloquence, to whom under his graphic delineations 
vice did not appear more odious, and virtue additionally attrac- 
tive. What conscience has not been aroused by his illustrations 
of man’s necessities, and of the adaptedness of religion to meet 
his spiritual wants. As he depicted to us the hopeless condition 
of the wicked in the dying hour, what heart has not breathed 
the silent prayer, ‘‘ Let me die the death of the righteous, and 
let my last end be like his.” 

Let us seek, then, to carry away from this hallowed scene 
salutary impressions.” And as we go back to our respective 
spheres of action, let us with firmer resolve act upon the prin- 
ciple which seems to have controlled him through life and which 
is embodied in the poet’s stirrmg verse : 

“Tis infamy to die and not be missed ! 


Or let all soon forget that thou didst e’er exist! 

Rouse to some work of high and holy love, 

* * * * * * * 

The good begun by thee shall onward flow, 

In many a brahching stream—and wider grow. 

The seed that in these few and fleeting hours 

Thy hands unsparing and unwearied sow, 

Shall deck thy grave with amaranthine flowers, 

And yield thee fruits divine in heaven’s immortal bowérs,” 


The resolution was seconded by Atsert T. Cnester, D. D., of 
Buffalo, of the class of 1834, with the following remarks : 


BrotHEers,—We are met to-day to congratulate each other 
and our beloved father, upon this the fiftieth anniversary of his 
presidency. Our hearts are glad,—our voices are loud in praise 
of those excellencies that have been made so conspicuous in his 
eareer. With ours, are joined the congratulations of a multitude 
of our brethren, who, by various causes, are forbidden to meet 


94 
with us, but whose hearts are here. Yet were our praises ten- 
fold louder, they would be Jost in the echoes of these past years, 
as they come rolling with thunder-voice, borne along upon the 
annals of the institution and finding a response in the cherished 
memories of every alumnus. 

The success of half a century is the highest eulogium. In 
this is the language of Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, 
verified ; “‘I said, days should speak and multitude of years 
should teach wisdom:’’—these days of the past, how eloquently 
they speak! this multitude of years, since he assumed this 
charge, what lessons of practical wisdom it reveals! Success 
commands our admiration, whatever its character. When intel- 
lect and will, the devices of mgenuity and the irresistible forces 
of industry and perseverance, are applied to the attainment of an 
end, we cannot but applaud the successful; we give them credit 
for energy and skill; we admire the manifestation of talent and 
address, irrespective of moral considerations. When the success 
of fifty years is the result,—-success in one of the noblest enter- 
prizes that can engage the powers of man,—success in the use 
of an instrumentality, combining in itself consummate wisdom 
and the purest benevolence, we can scarcely find language for 
our praises or a limit to our admiration. 

This instrumentality has been signally efficient in respect to 
the peculiar paternal government of the college. It was, and 
ever has been the policy of Dr. Nort, not so much to govern 
young men as to teach them to govern themselves. ‘There is no 
sympathy in this with the no-government doctrine, nor with that 
of moral suasion merely, omitting all proper discipline of the 
young. It is of itself positive; it has an object noble and 
worthy; it releases the young student, in the buoyancy and 
pride of his life, from slavish servitude, from cringing submis- 
sion, from the dread of a secret espionage, from the degrading 
effect of punishments that only wound the spirit:—it teaches 


95 


him to consider himself, that he may be so considered, a man 
and a gentleman. It allows for the thoughtlessness and ignor- 
ance of youth, while it expects frankness and truthfulness and 
the answer of an affectionate heart to the language of pater- 
nal kindness. It watches over the course of the student, not 
with the stern vigilance of a hostile spy, but with the unwav- 
ering fidelity of household love. It compels even each wayward 
careless youth to feel that his teachers are his friends; that 
they not only seek to promote the cultivation of his mind, but to 
cherish also the pure affections of his heart. It tends to the 
development of the whole being, and is calculated to make the 
graduate not merely a student, but a complete man, whose heart 
ean beat in unison with the great heart of humanity, and whose 
treasures of knowledge shall not be hoarded for their own 
increase, but expended for the enriching of all mankind. 

When Dr. Norr entered upon this office, there had been only 
from fifteen to thirty students in the institution at any time. The 
eollege, governed upon the old plan, was perpetually in trouble. 
The Faculty and the Trustees were occupied with crimes and 
criminal suspensions and expulsions. Under the new system, 
during fifty years, and when the graduating classes have num- 
bered scores, and sometimes more than an hundred, there has 
never been an expulsion or rebellion, or indeed a serious diffi- 
eulty of any sort between the Faculty and the Students. A few 
young men have turned out badly ; but, comparatively, very 
few. A great many, who contracted bad habits elsewhere, have 
been reformed here. And a reference to the catalogue will 
show that the number of distinguished men among the graduates 
of Union is very great. 

What multitudes of our young men have fallen victims to the 
unsparing and unwise application of mere authority under sys- 
tems of tyranny as oppressive as the despotisms of the Kast. 
The waste of raw material in these cases have been most alarm- 


96 


ing; it would terrify the community should it be fully known, 
For a trifling indiscretion, at an age when prudence is scarely a 


virtue,—for some act of thoughtless folly, before years have taught 


wisdom,—many a young man has been crushed im spirit and for- 
bidden to remain in the honorable path to scientific emimence or 
literary fame, turned aside by the rigorous penalty of college 
law to other pursuits, and perhaps consigned by very shame 
to a life of dissipation and infamy. ‘ 

What an array of names might be shown, of those who in their 
disgrace have found here a refuge, and have been saved from 
ruin and made useful and honorable in the various learned pro- 
fessions. They call our Alma Mater, Botany Bay. Let them 
ridicule. From this asylum have gone forth many minds re- 
deemed and ripened for usefulness, of richer metal and higher 
value than the golden stores of Australia, that land once known 
only as the convict’s inheritance. 

How often, as I know from experience, when in a faculty 
meeting the case of some young man has been discussed, and 
when for his indiscretions or his want of scholarship, the Profes- 
sors and Tutors have advised his removal,—how often has this 
good old man resisted all, and, as a father for a son, besought 
for the heedless youth a jlonger trial, and secured for him an 
honorable introduction into the world from these classic shades. 
How often has he, with more than a father’s love, interposed by 
his counsel and his prayers to stay the progress of those who 
were becoming victims to the arts of the destroyer,—-who were 
entangled in the meshes of the strong net of sensual indulgence. 
How many, now and heretofore, amid the days of their useful 
and happy lives, have had occasion to say, and often in their 
hearts have said, ‘‘ Blessings upon him whose patience and love 
were not exhausted by our follies and transgressions; who has 
borne with us until we too have seen the evil of our way and 
turned into the path of virtue and usefulness.” 


ee 


Under this system, self-respect and independence of thought 
and action are cultivated, so that those who pass through their 
collegiate course become much better fitted for all the duties of 
practical life. While as good facilities are afforded here, as in 
any other college, for the progress of the studious, for even the 
highest advancement of which the mind is capable in any depart- 
ment; while genius and special abilities are cherished and afforded 
scope for freest action, yet provision is made for the cultivation of 
those less favored in natural gifts, those whose habits of study are 
not so systematic and whose progress must be slower. There are 
posts of honor and influence all over the land to be filled accep- 
tably by those who have learned wisdom here, though they are 
not so thoroughly versed in the Grecian dialects, or so familiar 
with the processes of the Calculus. ‘This is the perfection of a 
collegiate system, to afford the highest advantages to those who 
seek and can improve them,— to offer five talents more to those 
who have five already, and at the same time to give an opportu- 
nity to all to improve their one talent to the utmost advantage. 

A distinguished clergyman in one of the New-England States, 
said to me, within the last fortnight, that in the college a few 
miles distant from his residence, the loss of students was at least 
twenty-five per centum, a loss resulting from the Proscrustean 
effort to bring all the minds of the young men within the same 
limits, and from the rigorous punishment of triflng misdemeanors. 
These old forms of monastic rigor are still in force all around us. 
Let the results of fifty years declare which is best. Have we 
any misgivings, honored Alumni, fathers and brethren, that the 
assembled graduates of any of our sister colleges would present 
an array of worthies among whom any one of us would choose 
the rather to be found? Let those who have gone out from this 
revered institution be followed upon the winding paths of their 
subsequent career, and it will be found, that for practical wis- 
dom, for real efficiency, for true learning, for stirring eloquence, 

N 


Behe. 


nay, for thorough scholarship, no class of educated men is supe- 
rior to that which has been sent out by old Union. ‘This result 
is, to a great extent, to be attributed to the resolute resistance 
of the young President to the prevailing tyranny of college gov- 
ernment. ‘This he attacked and conquered. It was a huge 
monster, a very Cyclops, blood-thirsty, satisfying its voracious 
appetite only with the human victims who ventured into its dark 
cavern,— deformed, one-eyed ; but resolute purpose and bravery 
and stratagem were all employed, and Polyphemus fell! here, as 
in classic story, crying out in his agony, that ovr1s, —nobody, — 
Nort,—slew him. 

And not only does this experience thus illustrate the Grecian 
story, — but have we not here a more complete exhibition of the 
power of the negative quantity in mathematics? What if it be 
an fideal number, existing not in reality, what an influence it 
ever exerts in its combinations with positive quantities in deter- 
mining the answers of the given proposition! Who shall properly 
estimate the power of the not / 

Here has been brought into action, also, a knowledge of the 
human heart almost intuitive, and yet increased by investigation 
and experiment to an amazing extent. Jam familiar with the 
traditions of the boyhood and youth of him whom we this day 
delight to honor, —our ancestors dwelling upon the same New- 
England hills. There are reports of daring adventure and mis- 
chievous exploit, quite startling and even criminal in the judg- 
ment of those rigid expounders of the laws of propriety, but all 
having a bearing, as it may now be seen, upon the great ques- 
tions of the formation of character, and the exercise of control 
over the human mind. He was then learning lessons for the 
accomplishment of these glorious results. Among many other 
stories, this is told. While yet a young lad in his brother’s 
house in Franklin, at the gathering of the family circle one 
morning, when all could observe it, a colored boy, a domestic, 


99 


suddenly sprang from his seat in the corner of the spacious fire- 
place, and pulling down the lid of the oven, crawled through the 
aperture and took his place within. He would make no explana- 
tion of this strange movement; and when again and again it 
was repeated at unexpected intervals, it was concluded that it 
must be something cognate with the Salem witchcraft. But it 
was afterwards ascertained who was the wizard. Our young 
philosopher was trying his power upon the human mind. He 
had succeeded im so bringing this specimen of humanity under 
his control, by promises, or threats, or both, that by the glance 
of his eye he looked him into the oven ;—he could then move 
another will as if responsive to his own. No power can be so 
dangerous when exercised for evil, —no power so desirable when 
used for the high and holy purposes to which this has been 
devoted,— guiding, restraining, controlling such an army of 
young men when character is formed and destiny settled; 
devoting its loftiest energies to the supply of our country’s most 
imperative want, —strong-minded, independent, thoroughly edu- 
cated, practical men. 

Let us, then, bless God that he has spared this valuable life 
so long; that disease and feebleness have not been allowed to 
triumph over him; that the breath of slander and the violent 
attacks of enemies have been turned away, and that, to-day, he 
stands before us bearing the honors of half a century, so strong 
in body, so vigorous in mind; occupying a prouder eminence 
than any throned monarch ; venerable, beloved, cherished in the 
deepest heart of every one of his three thousand sons, who delight 
to speak his praises in every part of the land. Long may he be 
spared here to give instruction and counsel to our children who 
now frequent these scenes amid which our youthful footsteps 
were planted ;—~long may his voice be heard, as a herald of sal- 
vation, proclaiming the Gospel of the Son of God,—and when, 
as a shock of corn fully ripe, he shall be gathered by the angel- 


100 


reapers, inay the richest blessings of our covenant Jehovah des- 
cend upon his sainted head. 


The resolution of Rev. Dr. Kennepy being heartily accepted, ‘‘ Dr. 
Porrer”’ was loudly called for, but transferred the call to Hon. 
Anprew W. Loomis, of Pittsburgh, Pa., of the class of 1819, as a 
representative of the West. Judge Loomis was wholly unprepared 
for this unexpected call, but responded to it in an eloquent eulogy of 
the characteristics and prospects of the great West and her people, 
and in an emphatic statement of the estimation in which the name of 
Dr. Norv was there held. 


Upon a reiteration of calls for ‘‘ Professor Porrer,”’ the Right Rev. 
Dr. Porrrr again came forward and remarked : 


‘¢T observe, Mr. Chairman, that the call is now for Professor 
Porrer; and if I am to resume the professorial chair [suiting 
the action to the word] I shall claim with it the right to expect 
my old pupils to obey my directions, as in the recitation room in 
former days, and to rise in their places as I call them up to re- 
cite; and I will commence my duties by calling on Mr. WiLtiaM 
Tracy, of Utica. Mr. Tracy!” 

Mr. ‘Tracy (class of 1824) thereupon rose and said : 

Mr. CHAIRMAN, we have heard something to-day in relation 
to the discipline of our Alma Mater, and in illustration of the 
force with which it was maintained by the Right Reverened Gen- 
tleman who has just resumed his chair, and which never permit- 
ted a college-boy to dream of refusing to respond to his call to 
stand up and recite, the habit of obedience formed under his 
training thirty years ago, in yonder college halls, has brought me 
to my feet. I have, however, in my hand, a resolution instead 
of a lesson, and unless I much mistake, it is one which will speak 
the sentiments of every college-boy whose training has been con- 
ducted under the eye of him whose clarwm et venerabile nomen 
is so dear to all the sons of Union College, and whose jubilee we 


101 


have this day come together to celebrate. ‘There are many of 
us in the world, but I have never met one of the number who 
did not regard that venerable old man with an affection only 
equalled by that for his parents. And when a shaft has been 
aimed against him or his fair fame, each of his pupils have felt 
that it was directed against his own heart. 

We all remember, Mr. Chairman, that, a few years since, oc 
casional dark and mysterious hints and surmises in relation to 
the management of the college funds, were whispered by persons 
who dared not embody them in tangible form or make them the 
subject of a palpable charge. As time passed on, the whispered 
doubt and the obscure hint gained courage and assumed some- 
thing of shape and distinctness, and yet no responsible person 
dared to put them forth in the shape of direct accusation. But 
Fame, sooner or later, will justify the character given her in the 
verses of the Mantuan bard we read in our school-boy days. 
The whispered doubt became a public accusation, the obscure 
hint a defiant impeachment, and throughout the length and 
breadth of the land it was proclaimed that he who commands 
our highest veneration and warmest affection, and who with sin- 
gular disinterestedness and never-flagging zeal, had devoted the 
energies of his noble nature for a half-century to the upbuilding 
of this seat of learning, and the extension and perpetuation of its 
usefulness, and whose mark for good had been made deep upon 
the history of our race, had laid dishonest hands upon funds 
which his life had been spent in securing for it. The foul charge 
reached the legislative halls of this state, and was again and 
again published by senators high in the public confidence, and, 
after having been dignified with the formality of an examination 
of a character new in parliamentary investigations, was re-echoed 
in a senatorial report as an ascertained and established fact. 
And yet no one of the pupils of that calumniated old man believed 
that the charge could be true: We, who knew him, knew, 


102 


we knew in our very heart of hearts, — that it was as false as it 
was cruel, and that time would surely vindicate his purity and 
integrity, and his love for our Alma Mater. But we also knew 
that he was a very old man: his life had already passed the 
three-score years and ten, and the fear that his fast flowing years 
might be embittered by the slander, and that the grave might 
receive his venerated form before the light of truth would vindi- 
cate his name and wipe away the stains which had been with 
singular pertinacity thrown upon it, saddened us. It was not 
that we feared the final triumph of his fame; but we did fear 
that the envenomed shaft would reach his heart, and hurry him 
to the grave before the hour of his triumph should arrive. 

In this trying hour, an eminent son of this institution volun- 
teered to stand forth as the champion of our venerated father, 
and by severe and patient investigation to unravel the poisoned 
web which prejudice and skilful misrepresentation had woven, 
and to illustrate the falsity of all that slander and suspicion had 
embodied in the accusation. It was a work of no trifling magni- 
tude. The records of all the college transactions for more than 
half a century, had been garbled, and distorted, and placed in 
false lights, by more than ordinary ingenuity, so as to make a 
plain tale of honest management appear a cunning contrivance 
of unprincipled peculation. To fathom all the depths of the dis- 
tortion and deception which had been practised upon them, and 
to extract and place in plaim and distinct view the naked truth — 
which they contained, so that he who runs might read it, required 
great and severe labor, and all the acumen of his mighty mind, 
and the singular industry and professional skill which character- 
ize him. He came to the work not as a mere professional advo- 
cate, retained to make the best of his client’s case ; not, as many 
have done, to employ distinguished talents and learning and 
position, to defend from the claims of justice a guilty man. He 
came freely and without fee. Asa son of this institution, he 


108 


came, with filial zeal and filial affection, and deep conviction of 
the righteousness of the cause, to dispel the clouds with which 
error and passion and malice had enveloped the truth, and by 
the clear light of that truth alone to vindicate the name dear to 
him, as to us all. It was a labor of love ; and most nobly, most 
triumphantly did ,he perform it. And in the brilliant career 
which his talents and his wisdom and learning have accomplished, 
he will look back to no more pleasing reminiscence than that of 
his services in the removing every shade from the fame of our 
beloved father. He has silenced every whisper, dispelled every 
lingering doubt which hung about it, and smoothed the pathway 
through which advanced years are rapidly carrying the footsteps 
of the good old man. The guide of our youth is vindicated — 
nobly vindicated by one of his most illustrious pupils, and we are 
all made happy. And now, while we have come up hither once 
more as in our boyhood, to receive his paternal blessing, and 
once more to take his hand within our own, perhaps never to see 
him again until we meet in the spiritland, I believe we shall 
all best express our feelings towards our distinguished brother, 
whose labors have afforded us this delightful enjoyment, by the 
passage of the resolution I have the honor to submit, and which 
I will now read : 


Resolved, That the gratitude of the Alumni of Union College is 
eminently due to their Brother, Joun C. Spencer, for his voluntary 
and unsolicited efforts in the defence of their Alma Mater and their 
revered President from the calumnious charges brought against them ; 
and for the patience, perseverance and great ability with which he 
performed, without fee or reward, that self-appointed duty, and achieved 
so triumphant a vindication. They therefore cordially approve of the 
contemplated placing of his portrait or bust in one of the public rooms 
of the College, as a lasting memorial of his noble and disinterested 
conduct. 


The resolution was passed unanimously. 


104 


Bishop Porrer being again loudly called for, again claimed his 
professorial right, and called on Prof. Groraz W. Eaton, D. D., (of 
the class of 1829,) who responded: as follows : 


REVEREND CHAIRMAN AND FELLOW-—ALUMNI :—This is an 
occasion which requires brevity in the speeches and unity in — 
the subject, and I shall not trespass upon its proprieties either 
by extended remarks or by discanting upon topics not having 
special reference to those personal honors and offerings of affec- 
tion which we all delight this day to tender to that venerated 
and beloved patriarch, whose paternal counsels and solicitudes 
have had so much to do in forming our characters and guiding 
our lives. An extraordinary scene, such as rarely occurs in the 
history of man, has been exhibited to us to-day. Its elements 
of interest can find no adequate expression in language, and 
they have awakened doubtless, in all our bosoms, emotions which 
refuse to be expressed in the limitations of verbal phraseology. 
What we have seen and heard furnishes abundant material for 
profitable reflection the rest of our lives. The incidents of 
the occasion are of no transient or superficial interest. They 
take hold of the noblest principles of our nature, and stir the 
depths of our best and purest emotions. They teach great 
moral lessons, which we shall do well to treasure up in our 
memories to be pondered in the moments given to silent medita- 
tion in the future. One of these lessons is, that there is a right- 
eous and beneficient Power above us, who loves human virtue 
and goodness, and makes the good name of his faithful servants 
the object of his special care. Under the watchful and protect- 
ing providence of that power, what a triumph we have been 
permitted this day to witness, of worth of the highest order, over 
a formidable and pertinacious conspiracy to extinguish its long- 
beaming and steady splendors,—a conspiracy which gathered 
to itself with unholy diligence, every available element of the 
slightest sinister aspect to darken the cloud with which it hoped 


105 


to overshadow the light it hated! How completely have the 
successive developments of events, consummated by the scenes 
of this day, overwhelmed and swept away all the schemes of 
defamation with their temporary effects, directed against the 
illustrious man who has been the centre of all regards on this 
occasion. How triumphantly and forever has been vindicated 
the character of him who to-day stood before us in all the untar- 
nished glory of a fame which has been continually gathering 
brightness for a half century. I am sure, fellow-Alumni, I shall 
meet a response in all your bosoms when I say that we needed 
not the developments which have so signally scattered the mists 
of detraction from the good name of our venerated father, to 
assure us of his incorruptible integrity and disinterested good- 
ness. For myself, I can truly say, that I felt, all the time the 
sinister proceedings were in progress, as confident, as I ever did 
that the sun in mid-heaven would emerge with renewed and 
enhanced radiance from behind the passing cloud which inter- 
cepted his beams, that the good name of Dr. Notr would come 
forth from the ordeal with brighter lustre than ever. I only 
feared lest at his advanced age he might not live personally to 
share on earth in the triumph which most surely would crown 
his memory. It has sometimes happened that a beneficent 
genius has poured his intellectual and moral treasures into the 
lap of an ungrateful and persecuting generation, and then passed 
away to the “‘ better land’’ under a cloud of envy and detraction. 
The voice of vindicatory justice and the peeans of grateful admi- 
ration have sounded over his tomb, but could not reach the 
“dull cold ear of death.’ His proud mausoleum is the work of 
an appreciating and thankful posterity, who, though the inheri- 
tors of his beneficence, never saw their benefactor. But justice 
and the appropriate reward of distinguished merit have not been 
thus tardy in the case of the venerated President of our cher- 
ished Alma Mater. He has been spared by a kind Providence 
0 


106 


to see this triumphal day which commemorates the semi-cente- 
nary of his eminently wise, successful and disinterested superin- 
tendency of one of the noblest institutions of our country, with 
whose life, character and influence his own have been indisso- 
lubly blended, and his personal services to which have been 
crowned by a princely munificence almost unparalleled in the 
history of public benefactions. His praises have been uttered in 
‘fitting phrase,” unmeasured and unqualified, by the “ brightest 
and best’ of that long line of ‘sons’ whom he has seen to go. 
forth in yearly succession from his paternal care, and been enthu- 
siastically responded to by the hundreds of assembled representa- 
tives of almost every generation of those sons, as well as by all 
others who can appreciate eminent worth long devoted to the 
highest service of mankind. And when his venerable and fami- 
har form and his hoary head, which in his case is emphatically a 
“‘ crown of glory,” because ‘found in the way of righteousness,” 
entered through that door, how our hearts bounded towards him, 
and with one simultaneous impulse we were all brought to our 
feet in token of our undissembled veneration and love. I believe 
in the propriety of outward manifestations of inward emotions. 
They are natural and spontaneous, and often irrepressible, and I 
doubt if any of us, with the physical power to rise, could have 
kept our seats under the emotions surging in our hearts. 
Another great moral lesson, emphatically inculcated by the 
doings and scenes of this day 1s, that it 1s a noble and a glorious 
thing to live for the highest good of our fellow-men. Who could 
have failed to feel the force of this lesson so impressively illus- 
trated as it has been by the pre-eminent example presented 
before us in so striking and beautiful relief on this occasion ? 
How ‘full of honors” as ‘of years,’”’—with how serene and 
unsullied a glory encircling his hoary head, has the aged man 
stood before us after a long life of unwearied devotion to pro- 
mote the highest intellectual and moral good of those under his 


L107 


immediate charge, and of all who came within the range of his in- 
fluence? How mighty and wide-spread has been the influence of 
the labors and life of this one great man,—an influence not to be 
measured by his individual and personal acts, signally beneficent 
as these have been, but by the aggregate of the separate influe 
ences of each one of the thousands to whose minds and charac- 
ters he has given mould and direction. We all have proved 
more or less the irresistible plastic power he exerted upon 
us. Few men have lived whose influence has been so predo- 
minant, controlling and decisive over those with whom they came 
in daily contact as Dr. Nort’s. He has im a measure multt- 
plied lumself by the numbers who have passed from under his 
trainng. Not, my fellow-Alumni, that he has been able to 
transfuse his mighty and affluent genius into our inferior capa- 
cities, but he has done what he could with us, and made up in 
numbers what was wanted in individual capacity. Nor were 
we passive under the operation. A part of his strange influence 
was owing to his power to awaken in us intellectual and moral 
life,—to set the faculties ef our own minds at work, and to arouse, 
develop and direct our best and noblest affections, and thus to 
send us forth to act a spontaneous and independent part on the 
great theatre of life. But he left his mark upon us—his image 
and superscription might be descried amid the characteristic pecu- 
harities of our own individualities which he apprehended with 
intuitive and almost superhuman sagacity, and strove with 
discriminating appliances to improve and exalt, but never to 
efface or impair. We can, my fellow-Alumni, bear our united 
testimony that his influence upon us, great as it may have been, 
was all good, and genial, and ennobling, and that the longer we 
live, and the more frequent the occasion for the practical applica- 
tion of the lessons he taught us, the deeper is our conviction that 
those lessons were eminently wise, and adequate to the emer- 
gency. There is to my mind naught derogatory to us, in the 


108 


fact that such a mind so ample in its capacities, so full of wisdom 
and goodness, should have had so great power over us. Nay, 
it indicates rather a nobleness in our own natures that we were 
susceptible of deep and lasting impressions from such a source. 
We may in our turn, in our several spheres, and according to 
our several capacities imitate his illustrious example, and strive 
to impart like impressions for good to those who may come 
within the range of our power, and thus share with him in the 
fame and glory of “serving our generation,” and perpetuating 
beneficent influences to coming ages. 

How full of the morally sublime was the spectacle of the ‘“ old 
man eloquent,” with the frosts of eighty winters upon his crown, 
delivering to us that extraordinary discourse, marked by those 
elements of intellectual vigor, comprehensiveness and adaptation, 
characteristic of his palmiest days, fraught with the richest 
lessons of moral wisdom, and breathing the same paternal solici- 
tudes which drew our hearts so reverently and fondly to him in 
the days of our under-graduateship. We are still proud to be 
called his ‘sons,’ now as then, and to look up to him as our 
‘father,’ indeed. When in his touching allusion to himself, he 
said he was like an aged tree, storm-beaten and stripped of its 
foliage, and lifeless in limb, I said to myself, Wot so, but rather 
like the monarch of the wood, still in the vigor of its glorious 
prime, with majestic trunk, and giant and wide-spreading branches 
clothed with dense foliage, not indeed in the verdure of gay 
spring, but in the variegated, rich and mellowed tints of sober 
autumn, and loaded with ripened fruit, beneath whose ample 
shade we are this day gathered to feast once more upon the pre- 
cious products. A dark and angry storm did, indeed, at one 
time, seem to be coming down upon that “ old familiar tree,” 
threatening to shatter and uproot it, and leave it a prostrate and 
mangled mass of ruin; but a kind Providence averted the menac- 
ing destruction, and it passed harmlessly aside without breaking 


109 


a limb or shakmg a leaf from its stem ; or, to use a figure more 
appropriate to the fact, its massive strength and unimpaired 
soundness in every part, easily resisted the force of the blast, 
and turned it back upon its evil source, to work its destruction 
there. I need not say how sincere and profound is our gratifi- 
cation at the issue, how joyous and exultant our congratulations 
to him and among ourselves. We are sharers in his spotless 
name,—participants in the glory of his triumph. 

Fellow-Alumni,— We may have listened for the last time to 
the living words of exalted wisdom and paternal affection from 
the lips of the illustrious sage and patriarch. In that remarka- 
ble discourse which he has just delivered to us, and at whose 
rich and melodious close, ‘in our ears’ 


* So charming left his voice, that we awhile 
Thought him still speaking, still stood fix’d to hear,” 


containing a clear and graphic epitome of the eventful changes 
of the last fifty years — 
‘ queeque ipse vidit 
Et quorum pars magna fuit— 

so free from the querulousness and retrospective longings cha- 
racteristic of the aged, so full of generous sympathies with the 
progressive spirit of the times, so hopeful of the future, so fraught 
with the practical wisdom of the sage, and so glowing with the 
solicitous affection of the father, he has left us a precious legacy, 
as rich in moral, as his munificent donation to our venerated 
Alma Mater is in material wealth. Let us receive it with filial 
and grateful hearts, and wisely improve upon the inherited cap- 
ital. 

Finally, — Let his parting words evermore ring in our ears — 
let their echoes live in the deepest recesses of our hearts, keep- 
ing us mindful of the lessen imparted, and of the illustrious 
teacher who presents in his own life and deeds the best exempli- 
fications of his own lessons. 


110 


The following remarks and resolution were then offered by Frank 
H. Hamizron, M. D., of Buffalo, of class of 1830: 

Mr. CHAIRMAN, —I am about to offer a resolution of which 
I will say, as the honorable gentleman who first addressed us 
said of the resolution of which he was the mover: ‘ I believe it 
will meet the approbation and receive the cheerful vote of every 
gentleman in the house.” 

With your permission I will read the resolution : 


Whereas we, the Alumni of Union College, would establish some 
suitable and permanent memorial to the virtues of our illustrious Pre- 
sident—therefore, 

Resolved, That we will order to be executed, and at the earliest 
practicable day to be erected upon the college grounds, a Statue in 
marble of the Rev. Extrpuater Norv. 

Resolved, That for the accomplishment of this resolution, a commit- 
tee of five shall be appointed, who shall be invested with full powers 
and authority to act in the premises. 

I do not feel it necessary to defend this motion, or to urge the 
claims of Dr. Norr to the distinction which it proposes. I am 
in the midst of those who know him well, and I find no occasion 
here to proclaim his praises. You, gentlemen, do not seek to 
know, nor have you need to be told, what are his merits, and 
how much good he has done. His eulogy is written in the heart, 
and his deeds are fragrant in the memory of every man and 
woman within these walls. There is, I believe, among us all, a 
common sentiment, and a common impulse,—a sentiment of 
simple, unaffected admiration, and an impulse of gratitude. 
There is, likewise, but one mquiry,—‘ In what manner can we 
best requite the service he has rendered us, and the yet greater 
service which his life and his acts contemplate for the future ?”’ 

T do not see that we can hope to repay him with money, after 
he has so often and again demonstrated how little value he 
attaches to it, except as it may be made subservient to the pur- 
poses of public education and of morals. Certainly not by the 
proposition which I now ask you to entertain, will he be repaid, 


111 


since though we thus feebly symbolize his virtues, and seek to 
perpetuate his memory in living stone, yet has he not already 
with his own hands wrought out for himself a name, and a memo- 
rial far more enduring than marble? Nor, indeed, by offers of 
place or of excellent titles, for he has, I trust, long since secured 
to himself a place more valuable and a title more excellent and 
inalienable than any which man can bestow. 

I fear, sir, we shall seek in vain for the means wherewith we 
may adequately compensate that venerated man, and it only 
remains for us to testify our gratitude by this trifling act, while 
we shall also in some measure testify to future generations our 
estimate of his greatness. 

Dr. Nort has not waited until his own decease would render his 
property valueless to himself; but, with a generosity as noble and 
disinterested as it is singular, he has made and executed this mu- 
nificent bequest, to be used and enjoyed by us during his own life. 

It will but suitably reflect this example of true benevolence, if 
we signify our appreciation of his conduct, also, while he lives. 
Let us erect at once, or at the earliest practicable day, a statue 
in marble, pure, white and immaculate as the brow and as the 
character of the good man whose beloved form it will represent, 
and to receive whose blessing we are now all, and probably for 
the last time, gathered here together. 


The resolution was carried unanimously.* 


The Chairman then called upon the Rev. Cuarres Brooks, of Bos- 
ton, as a representative of a sister college. He responded as follows: 


Mr. Presipent,—I have no right to one of the golden mo- 
ments of this red-letter day in learning’s calendar ; but, being 


* At an informal meeting of the Alumni, held in the evening, the following 
Alumni were appointed this committee; Hon. Joun C. Spencer, Hon. Wm. 
W. Campsetyt, Hon. Wittiam Kent, Hon. Atonzo C. Paice, and Hon. Wm. 
H. Van ScHoonHOovEN; at the same time, Dr. Hamttron offered to become 
one of ten persons to subscribe $100 each, or one of twenty to snbscribe $50 
each. 


112 


called upon as a son of old Harvard, I am bound to say that I 
have no legal warrant for appearing as the representative of our 
three colleges in Massachusetts ; nevertheless, I can safely affirm. 
that they extend to you at this hour the right-hand of fellowship ; 
they kneel with you at the altar to thank God for his preserving 
the life of your illustrious President, and they pray with you that 
it may be long ere his spirit return to the skies. We thank 
you for your appreciating notice of this anniversary. You are 
nobly proving that the literary republic, like the civil, is not 
ungrateful. By this act you are reaching every college in our 
country, and in every one of them you are giving ardor to virtue 
and confidence to truth. We thank you: we twice thank you. 

The accomplished King of Bavaria heard that a faithful 
schoolmaster in his realm was Just completing the fiftieth year 
of his silent and sacred labor; he immediately called the aged 
Teacher to the palace, learned all the facts of his unobtrusive 
life, and appointed the approaching anniversary to be kept as a 
jubilee. On this sacred occasion the King himself delivered the 
address, and crowned his wise act by a generous pension. His- 
tory loves to record such doings of justice and munificence. 

On this day, when you are making a half-century telegraph 
to all future time, when each thought and deed has its own pro- 
per polarity, no more need be said to explain the reference of 
the few following lines, wherein is announced the great truth, 
that the best proof of our love of God is usefulness to man: 


“¢ Abou Ben Adhem, (may his tribe increase,) 
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace, 
And saw, within the moonlight in his room, 
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom, 

An Angel, writing in a book of gold. 

Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold, 
And to the presence in the room he said, 

‘What writest thou? The vision raised his head, 
And, with a look made all of sweet accord, 
Answered,—‘ The names of those who love the Lord.’ 
‘And is mine one?’ said Abou. ‘ Nay, not so,’ 
Replied the Angel, Abou spoke more low, 


113 


But cheerly still, and said,—‘I pray thee, then, 

Write me as one that loves his fellow-men,’ 

The Angel wrote, and vanished. The next night 

He came again wifh great awake ning light, 

And showed the names whom love of God had blessed, 
And lo! Ben Adhem’s mame led all the rest.” 


The following resolution was then presented by Hon. D. R. Fioyp 
Jones, of Long Island, of the class of 1832 : 

Resolved, That the thanks of the Alumni of Union College, here 
present, be and they are hereby tendered to the Hon. Judge Camp- 
BELL, and the Rev. Dr. Wayuanp, for the very appropriate, interest- 
ing and instructive addresses delivered by them this morning ; that 
copies thereof be requested for publication ; and that the same, when 
obtained, be published under the direction of the Faculty of the Col- 
lege, together with the address of Dr. Norr to the Alumni, and the 
proceedings of the meeting. 


The resolution was unanimously carried. 


Many more of the Alumni were desirous of expressing their sympa- 
thies with the objects of the gathering; but were prevented by the 
lateness of the hour. The meeting then adjourned. 


In the evening, the Alumni re-assembled in great numbers at the 
Old College (which had been prepared for the occasion with ever- 
greens, portraits, busts, &c.,) to pay their respects individually to 
Dr. Nort, and to interchange congratulations with one another. They 
separated at a late hour, to meet on the next morning at the annual 
Commencement. 

Pp 


114 


ODE: 


FOR THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF DR. NOTT’S PRESIDENCY, 


BY REY. E. H. SEARS, OF CLASS OF 1834.” r 


“We ’ve wandered east, we ’ve wandered west,” 
Since through these walks we strayed, 
And fondly dreamed our waking dreams 
In Union’s soothing shade ; 
We now return with sandals worn 
To Learning’s ancient shrine, 
Where busy memories start and throng 
From days of auld land syne ; 
From auld lang syne so dear, 
From auld lang syne; 
The thronging memories fond and dear 
Of auld lang syne! 


We ’ve wandered east, we ‘ve wandered west, 
On prairie, shore and sea, 
And some have found the last, long rest 
Beneath the willow tree ; 
We roamed with them through Learning’s bowers, 
And plucked its “ gowans fine,” 
We girded on our armor bright 
With them in days lang syne; 
In auld lang syne so dear, 
In auld lang syne ; 
We'll breathe for them one sorrowing strain, 
Of auld lang syne. 


We 've wandered east, we ’ve wandered west, 
O’er many a shifting scene; 
This spot in all the length’ning past 
Has only grown more green, 
For here our Father, Friend and Sage, 
With locks of silvery shine, 
Kept watch above our youthful ways 
In days of auld lang syne; 
In auld lang syne so dear, 
In auld lang syne; 
We ’ve kept his memory fond and bright 
From auld lang syne. 


When, borne upon the solemn sea 
From Time’s receding shore, 
Union! thy light from which we steered 
Shall greet our eyes no more; 
Still, thou the Pharos of the waves 
Shalt o’er the waters shine, 
And bear upon thy glorious front 
Our name from years lang syne; 
From auld lang syne so dear, 
From auld lang syne, 
That father’s loved, remembered name 
From auld lang syne, 


*Sung after Dr, Nott's Address to the Alumni; and accidentally omitted in its proper place, 


APPENDIX TO DR. NOTT’S ADDRESS, 


APPENDIX A, 
Berween Albany and Schenectady, there was a vontest in relation to 
the location of Union College. Both urged ‘their respective claims 
before the Regents. It was, finally, through the influence of Gen. 
Scuuyier, awarded to Schenectady. Among the reasons for this 
award, was the actual running of a stage to and from the place. 

This location of the College gave offence to Albany. A settled 
opposition to the College was the consequence. This opposition con- 
tinued during the presidencies of Drs. Smrtu, Epwarps and Maxcy. 

On the election of the present incumbent, who was at the time a 
citizen of Albany, and who had many friends there, this opposition, to 
a great extent, subsided. Some traces of the original feud, however, 
long continued, and have not even yet, perhaps, entirely disappeared. 

The election of the present incumbent, in 1804, was soon after the 
republican triumph in the State. The College, at the time, being 
greatly embarrassed, it was proposed by the President to apply to the 
legislature for aid. This the Trustees declined doing, on the ground 
that such an application would, if made, be useless. The President, 
therefore, made application on his own responsibility; and, as provi- 
sion for collegiate instruction must be vain, unless the masses were 
educated from which the College must receive its pupils to educate, it 
was deemed expedient that provision for both objects should be made 
at the same session. Morcean Lewts, who was then Governor of the 
State, was induced to send to the legislature a special message in favor 
of these chjects. 

This movement in favor of Common Schools was looked on with dis- 
favor in many of the counties where the Hollanders were in the ascen- 
daney, and by the representatives from some of them was violently 
opposed. 

Among the most active and powerful opposers of the bill for the 
appropriation of the avails of the public lands for the support of Com- 
mon Schools, was Srepuzen Lusu, Hsq., a member of the Assembly 
from the city of Albany. Mr. Lusi was a lawyer of eminence, and 
pore great popular eloquence. The most able advocates of this 

ill, in the Assembly, were Witnram W. Van Nuss, afterwards Judge 
Van Nuss, from Columbia county, and General Josepn Kirxxanp, 
from Oneida county, an enlightened and able man. All these gentle- 
men, though taking opposite sides in relation to the appropriation for 
Common Schools, were in favor of the endowment of Union College. 


Tau; 


Both these bills were introduced in the Assembly early in the ses- 
sion ; they progressed together, as the session advanced, but neither 
became a law till near the close of it. 

Judge Peck, a Senator from Otsego county, was a great friend of 
the Common School bill. But doubting the sincerity of the President 
of the College, in his professed interest in Common Schools, the ses- 
sion was far advanced before his doubts were so far overcome as to 
admit of bringing the friends of these two interests to act in concert. 
This, however, was finally effected, and the influence in favor of edu- 
cation became, in the Assembly, the controlling interest of the session. 

The original project was, to dispose of all the public lands, and to 
apply the interest of the avails, as fast as sales were made, to the 
immediate furtherance of Common School education. And so power- 
ful was the interest in favor of this measure that it could have been 
earried by a large majority, in that Assembly. But in the Senate it 
was otherwise: Judge Peck, therefore, thought it wise to compromise 
for a part, only, of the public lands. 

The fate of the bill was doubtful in the Senate. Many of the Sena- 
tors were opposed to providing, at the public expense, for Common 
School education. Among those who doubted the expediency of the 
measure, was the Hon. Aprauam Van VecurteEn, of Albany, a Sena- 
tor of great influence. But perceiving that a powerful interest had 
been created, in favor of the measure, and believing it to be tempo- 
rary, only, he said to the President of Union College, ‘‘ you, and your 
‘‘ friends, have got up such an excitement in favor of Common Schools, 
‘‘that it is, perhaps, necessary to do something for them. Now, if 
‘vou will consent to have that bill so amended, that no money shall 
‘‘ be distributed till the annual income of the lands sold shall amount 
«to $50,000, we will pass the bill through the Senate.’’ Adding, 
that ‘‘long before that period arrives, however, we shall repeal the 
“law.” 

This proposition was’ agreed to, and the bill was so amended, and 
passed. And though many counties declined acting upon it, still it 
grew in favor. Neither party dared to attack it. In a short time it 
became a matter of strife between the parties, to show which was its 
most devoted friend; and on the revision of the constitution, so uni- 
versal was the opinion of the people in its favor, that a provision for 
its perpetuity was inserted in the constitution, and it thus became, 
and has since continued to be, a part of the organic law of the State of 
New-York. 

During the passage of the bill for the endowment of Union College, 
some incidents occurred which it may not, perhaps, be improper to 
record. 

The Legislature, at the time, was democratic or anti-federal, as it was 
usually called. Several of the principal advocates of the College endow- 
ment, as well as of the contemplated provision for Common Schools, 


117 


were federalists, and some of them violent partizans. This was particu- 
larly the case with W. W. Van Ness, afterwards Judge Van Ness, 
and Gen. Josepu Kirguanp, to both of whom our Schools and Col- 
leges are greatly indebted. These gentlemen roomed together; and 
were charged with the care of both of these bills. They were both 
particular friends of the President of Union College ; and being over- 
whelmed with business, they had said to him, ‘‘ we have not time to 
‘nay mach attention to the College bill, but if you will present us, 
‘*from time to time, with an outline of the facts and arguments bearing 
‘*on the subject, we will cheerfully advocate the same, in all its stages, 
‘‘ through the Assembly.”’ 

As these gentlemen were of different politics from the majority of 
the house of which they were members, the President of the College 
urged on them the necessity, for the sake of accomplishing a great 
public good, of conciliating the party to which they were opposed, and 
of avoiding in debate, or in their intercourse with individuals anything 
that might tend to weaken their influence. They promised to do so, 
at least till the College bill and the Common School bill were disposed 
of. It so happened, however, that these bills were not disposed of till 
near the close of the session. ‘True to this arrangement, these gentle- 
men, particularly Mr. Van Ness, who was the chief speaker, adopted 
the most conciliating manners; conversing not only familiarly with, 
but offering his tobacco box with the same courtesy to friends and foes 
alike, and treating in the most respectful manner his opponents in 
debate. Sometimes, however, vexed at what was said by the oppo- 
site party, he became impatient of the restraint imposed on him, and 
under the influence of this impatience he one day said te the Presi- 
dent, ‘‘I wish this bill of yours was disposed of: I want to retort on 
‘<some of those abusive and incorrigible democrats.”” The President 
replied, ‘‘ you cannot do this till my bill is passed, and it will be wise 
‘‘for you not to do it afterwards.’’ The delay which took place in the 
passing of the bill in question, and the perseverance in the conciliatory 
manner adopted, and the persuasive and powerful eloquence which 
Mr. Van Ness possessed, gradually gained upon the house, till he 
acquired a prevailing influence over it. Perceiving this himself, he, 
one day, said to the President, ‘‘I find this advice of yours so s sie 

‘tary, that though I am not bound to follow it after your bill is passed, 
‘J am inelined to think I shall continue to act in conformity to it.”’ 
And he did continue to act in conformity to it, through life. And all 
who remember him will recollect how controlling his influence ulti- 
mately became, as well with those who differed as with those who 
agreed with him in politics. 

” On one oceasion havi ing made a somewhat less elaborate and impres- 
sive speech than he was accustomed to make, when discussing the 
merits of the College appropriation, he said playfully, in reply” to 3 
remark made at a party at which he was present in the evening, that 


118 


‘the President of the College had been at his room, and undertook to 
‘« show him that if this bill passed, it never would thereafter cost any 
‘‘body anything to educate their sons at College, and that he so pre- 
‘‘sented the facts and arguments that went to establish this position, 
‘that he himself thought he saw the connection between the proposi- 
‘tion and the proof of its truth, and that he could make the House 
‘see it. But that when he rose in his place to do so, those facts and 
‘‘arouments had entirely escaped him, and he could not, for his life, 
‘‘recollect one of them; which was the reason of the brevity and seem- 
‘‘ing inappropriateness of his morning speech, and the apparent want 
‘* of connection between his premises and his conclusion.”’ 

During the pending of the College bill, and which, on a certain 
Monday was to come up immediately after the discussion of the School 
bill, the friends of the College bill being unwilling that it should be 
discussed in the absence of Mr. Van Ness, who had gone to Hudson 
and had not returned at the opening of the House, Mr. Srepuun Lusu 
was asked by the President of the College if he would not extend his 
speech upon the School bill, so that the College bill might not be taken 
up till Mr. Van Nuss arrived. To this request, he replied, ‘‘ yes; 
‘‘and I will speak all day if it is necessary.’’ And he did speak a great 
part of the day, and doubtless would have redeemed his pledge for 
the entire day without inconvenience, such was his facility of speaking, 
had not Mr. Vaw Ness rendered it unnecessary by presenting himself 
in the Assembly Chamber. 

Though the application on behalf of the College on this occasion, 
was only for $45,000, since the grant made was to be raised by lot- 
tery, and since lotteries had already been granted for several years to 
come, the grant was increased to $80,000, to provide for the interest 
on the $45,000, immediately required, till the same could be raised 
as provided for. The balance; if any, was to be appropriated to the. 
aiding of indigent students. | ; 

After finishing, with the avails of this grant, the stone College 
(hereafter to be appropriated to the use of the Schools of the city) and 
after enlarging the then existing College site and erecting the adjoining 
brick College, long since disposed of, it was found that the location in 
the city was an undesirable one. 

The President of the College, therefore, on his own responsibility 
commenced the purchase of numerous pieces of property held by differ- 
ent individuals, with a view to the site of future buildings, and which 
eventually became the site of the present College buildings ; the whole 
of which grounds, as they at present exist, amount to nearly three 
hundred acres. On these grounds the existing buildings were com- 
menced in 1812; and in 1814, the Legislature passed an act for the 
further endowment of Union College, 

By this act, $30,000 was granted for the payment of debts already 


119 


contracted ; $100,000 for the erection of buildings ; $20,000 for 
Library and apparatus, and $50,000 for the aid of indigent students. 

This last appropriation owed its existence in no small degree to the 
influence of Hon. Judge Witt1am Duerr, then a young man, and a 
member of the Assembly. The other principal advocates of the bill 
were Hnisua WituraMs, of Hudson, who took charge of it, and Dayip 
B. Oapen, of New-York. Many others spoke in its favor, and the 
vote in the Assembly on its final passage was almost unanimous. 

In the Senate, the Hon. Martin Van Buren, since President of 
the United States, took charge of this bill; and owing to his influence 
more than to that of any other Senator, it was carried through the 
Senate, also by a very large majority. Senators Wirxin, Rapotire 
and Yass, and others, gave it their active support. General Roor 
was its uniform and violent opponent; but notwithstanding his opposi- 
tion, there were in the Senate but seven votes against it, on its final 
passage. 

There were some circumstances attending the progress and final 
passage of this bill, that it may not be improper to record. 

At the time this bill passed the Senate, that body had two daily 
sessions. In passing through the Senate this bill was amended, and 
the bill with the amendments was sent back to the other House for its 
consideration—and having been acted on by that House was sent back 
to the Senate during its afternoon session. On that day a dinner was 
given by the steamboat interest, to which many of the friends of the 
bill were invited. The President of Union College, who had also been 
invited, apprehensive that some advantage might be taken by the ene- 
mies of the bill, in the afternoon session, should it be returned during 
that session, declined the invitation given him. The event showed 
that his apprehensions were not without cause. For on the assembling 
of the Senate, in the afternoon, it was found that every opponent of 
the bill was present; whereas many of its friends were absent, at the 
dinner. And no sooner was this bill returned to the Senate, than Gen. 
Roor moved the postponement of the consideration of the same till the 
month of May, before which time it was known the Legislature would 
adjourn. 

None of the prominent speakers friendly to the bill, were present. 
The President of the College, however, succeeded in getting several 
individuals to make short speeches against the motion. In the mean- 
time, a messenger was sent to the place where the dinner was given, to 
inform the friends of the bill there, of the danger to which it was, by 
this unusual proceeding exposed, and to call them to its rescue. The 
Senators to whom the appeal was made, had the magnanimity to 
respond to this call, and leaving their unfinished repast, hastened to 
the Senate chamber, gave their votes; and having thus secured the 
passage of the bill one day sooner than it would otherwise have been 


120 


passed, returned (with unimpaired appetites, it 1s presumed,) to 
resume the places they had left at the dinner table. 

During the progress of this bill through the House, Judge Platt, 
one of the Trustees of Hamilton College, wrote to the President of 
Union College, that he was very unwilling to embarrass the applica- 
tion of Union College to the legislature for aid, but that Hamilton 
College was in great want, and that $30,000 would be of more aid to 
the institution then, than at any future time; and if it were possible 
to add a clause to the bill before the Assembly for this additional 
amount, it would be regarded as a special favor. The President 
replied, that the cause in which he was engaged was a common cause, 
and that it would give him as much pleasure to be instrumental in aid- 
ing Hamilton as Union College, and that the request made in behalf 
of Hamilton College should be attended to. 

In like manner an application was made in behalf of the College of 
Physicians and Surgeons, of New-York, and was, in a like manner, 
acceeded to, and a clause providing therefor incorporated in the bill. 

Though a powerful interest had been concentrated, in both houses, in 
favor of doing something during the present session, for the promotion 
of science in the Empire State, there were enemies to the measure, 
both in and out of the legislature. 

Some of these individuals were known to have suggested to the 
friends of Columbia College then at Albany, that since grants were 
likely to be made to Union and Hamilton Colleges, it would be a good 
time for Columbia College to present its claims. Hence, when these 
claims were afterwards presented, many of the friends of Union Col- 
lege, believing that this movement had been made with a view, not to 
aid Columbia College, but to defeat the whole bill in question, opposed 
the incorporating of the claims of Columbia College, at so late an hour, 
in the same bill with the claims of the other Colleges; and tried to 
induce the President of Union College to co-operate with them in their 
opposition. This he declined doing; but said, on the contrary, with 
respect to the application from Columbia College, as he had already 
said with respect to that from Hamilton College, that the cause was a 
common one, and that it would give him pleasure to have the claims 
of Columbia College provided for in his bill together with the claims 
of the other Colleges; and aclause providing therefor was accord- 
ingly inserted in said bill. 

When it became known that the application of Columbia College 
was approved cf by the President of Union College, the same indi- 
viduals who suggested that application, now became more opposed 
than ever to the entire bill. And as the Rev. Dr. Mason, so justly 
celebrated for learning and eloquence, who came to Albany for the 
purpose of advocating the claims of Columbia College, was personally 
offensive, on account of his politics, to certam individuals, he having 
been a decided federalist, and in the habit of freely discussing political 


121 


questions during Mr. Jurrerson’s administration, it was thought advis: 
able that he should withdraw from Albany. And it was agreed be- 
tween him and the President of Union College, that the interests of 
both institutions should be committed to the latter. In conformity to 
this agreement, the President of Union College took the entire charge 
of the claims of all the institutions, during the successive stages of the 
bill, till it finally became a law, on the 15th day of April, 1814. 


APPENDIX B. 

When the present incumbent of the Presidency of Union College 
was elected, the government of the College was administered by the 
Kaculty, and on the same principles that the government of the New- 
Mngland Colleges had, in the times preceding, been administered. 

The number of scholars was very small; suspensions and expulsions 
had been frequent, and much inconvenience had been occasioned to 
the Trustees, as well as the Faculty, by the irreeularity of the 
students. 

During the first year or two of the administration of the government, 
after the election of the present President, no change was attempted. 
The Faculty met and sat as a court, arraigned offenders, examined 
witnesses and passed judgment, with all the solemnity and formality 
of a civil court. This occupied much time and occasioned much per- 
plexity ; and, besides, it was found practically to array the students 
against the Faculty, to prevent mutual confidence, and to provoke, 
rather than deter, from transgression. 

At length, one of the Professors of College and a student came to 
an issue on the question of his right to illuminate his room, on a cer- 
tain occasion. ‘he student would not retreat, and was therefore 
expelied. His father appealed to the Board of Trustees, which the 
charter of the College gave him aright to do; and after the College 
had been disturbed by the discussion of the question for six months, 
the student was restored to his standing. 

The President of the College then determined never again to con- 
vene the Faculty on a question of discipline, and though fifty years 
have since elapsed he has never since done so. After the announce- 
ment of this determination, he proposed to the Board to fit up rooms 
in the College and move into them with his family, and thus person- 
ally take charge of the government of the imstitution. He was told 
by the Trustees that he would not be able to live in College a month ; 
and though they reluctantly consented that he should try the experi- 
ment, insisted that it should be tried at the least practical expense, as 
it was not possible that it should succeed. for the last half century, 
however, it has succeeded. Nor has he in the meantime, nor has a 
member of his family, ever received either injury or insult from any 
member of College. 

The government of the College in the meantime has been paternal 

Q 


122 


—adapted to the age, temper and constitution of the individual. 
Whenever an individual has been found offending in conduct or delin- 
quent in study, he has been sent for and treated as nearly as possible 
as a parent would treat a child under similar circumstances. His 
most intimate companions have been interested in his behalf, and if a 
member of a Society, that Society has been appealed to, and every 
influence at command brought to bear upon him. ‘These efforts, per- 
severed in, have almost always proved successful. When this has not 
been the case, the parent or guardian has been requested to withdraw 
his son or ward, as the case may be; and the relation of the delinquent 
with the institution is thus terminated privately, and with the least 
possible injury to him, and he is left at liberty to complete his educa- 
tion elsewhere, which is sometimes happily done with entire success, 
and always with the entire approbation, and often by the advice and 
with the assistance of the College which he leaves. 

Little reliance has been made on appeals to the principle of fear. 
Emulation has sometimes been appealed to, and to an extent that has 
proved injurious. But latterly the moral and religious principle, the 
sense of honor and the love of knowledge have been principally relied 
on; and the chief concern has been to teach the young men to govern 
themselves rather than to be governed. 

This system of government the Trustees, by accepting the conditions 

f the Trust Deed of EH. Norr and U. HE. Norr, which recognizes it, 
have now made permanent and perpetual in Union College. And 
this they were the more ready to do, as since its adoption, there has 
neither been a general rebellion, or an expulsion, or any resistance in 
any way to the government of College. And besides, under this 
regimen, many very unpromising young men have been reformed, who 
are now occupying prominent places in the church, or at the bar, or 
in some other useful and honorable occupation. 

The course of education, as well as the system of government, have 
undergone such changes as the wants of this young, free country 
seemed to require. And though the usual classical course of studies, 
including the Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew languages, has been pre- 
served, a separate, scientific course has been instituted ; in which the 
modern languages have been substituted in place of the ancient. 
Besides these two regular courses of study, provision has been made 
for giving instruction in such select studies as may be desired. 

A higher course of study, for resident graduates, is about to be 
established. When this is done, the requisite provision, it is thought, 
to a great extent, will have been made for meeting the wants of the 
country and the age in which we live. 


7. 
Se 


IMPORTANT. 
Arterary and Seientitle Celorks, 


PUBLISHED BY 


@. ¥. VANDEBOGERE, 
BOCHENEOLADY, N= ¥ 


Nichol ‘ Wonks. 


A System of Mornl Science. By Laurens P. Hickox, 
D. D. This work is intended as a text-book for colleges and 
academies, and is already introduced in most of the leading 
colleges of the United States. 


Science of the Mind from Consciousness. By Lavrens 
P. Hickox, D.D. The above work has been recently issued, 
and is already used as a text-book in many of the best colle- 
ges in the country. 


Lational Psychology. By Laurens P. Hickox, D. D. 
This work is a large 8vo of 600 pages, and has a wide repu- 
tation among that class of readers and students for whom it is 


adapted. 


acksow » AW onde. 


An Elementary Creatise on Optics. By Isaac W. Jack- 
son. This book contains 260 pages 8vo and 11 plates, and 
is printed on the finest of paper. It has been adopted in most 
of the leading colleges and universities, and 1s equally popular 
with professors and students. 


Elementary Creatise on Mechanics. By Isaac W. Jack- 
son. <A second edition of this work has just been published, 
uniform with the Optics. It is m general use as a text-book. 


Clements of Cunic Section. By Isaac W. Jackson. 
A valuable text-book for colleges and academies, published 
uniform with the Optics and Mechanics. 


A Gonparative German and English Grammar. 
By Exias Pressner, Professor, &c., in Union College. 


An Analysis of Kames’ Elements of Criteism. 
A small work in pamphlet form. Price 25 cents. 


G. Y. VanpEsocert would also announce that he has 
in press and will shortly publish, an important work to theo- | 
logians and literary men generally, by Professor Taytor 
Lewis, of Union College, entitled 


She Six Days of Creation. 


30 


112 105940065 


